Making It Stranger
by ACleverName
Summary: The Doctor arrives in Arkham Asylum while Jack Harkness meets Batman. Cardiff must brace itself for a visit from the Clown Prince of Crime. A Batman/Nolan!verse cross over with Doctor Who and Torchwood. Rated M for violence later on in the story.
1. Chapter 1

Jack Harkness was glad for small miracles. After Ianto had let the Torchwood pet pterodactyl go missing, it was Jack's responsibility to get it back. At least, he thought, surveying Cardiff from the top of the Wales Millennium Centre, it was dark and a Sunday night, so that those enjoying Brains would be in their flats and houses rather than on the streets. Someone might chance to look up and see a stray wing against the grey clouds, but hopefully they'd shake their heads and move on without saying a word.

"Ah, there she is," said Jack, putting down his binoculars and climbing down to find the lift. No need to even jump into the SUV; the pterodactyl hadn't strayed far. By his calculation, she was down by Mermaid Quay, directly over the American diner opposite Coffee Mania. It was late enough (or early enough, depending on how you looked at it) that the diner would be shut down. This should be quick and simple.

"Ianto, you naughty boy," Jack said into his ear-piece as he arrived in Roald Dahl Plas from the interior of the Torchwood Hub. He ran across toward the Bay, the moonlight glinting on the Norwegian Church and the string of fairy lights on the fencing. "Do you know how many spankins you're going to be getting because of this?"

Jack wasn't totally surprised that Ianto hadn't responded; he was off on his own in the cell block of the Torchwood facility and would likely be using this as an excuse to refuse to communicate. Ianto liked his sulks. Jack abandoned trying to taunt Ianto over his ear-piece and moved into the shadows separating the American diner from the building beside it. He looked up and could see the nervously shifting pterodactyl on top of the building, trying to nab seagulls as they flew by. "Shhh," he said softly, beckoning it. "Just . . . stay there . . ."

Jack took one step to his left, and suddenly he was falling. He knew this wasn't possible since he had just been standing on solid pavement without a hint of a crack or uneven surface. Then again, he thought, maybe he'd gotten swept up into the Rift without noticing. His instruments would have gone off? He tapped uselessly at his wrist communicator as he kept falling downward. _Into the rabbit hole_? he asked himself. He landed with a thud, still in the dark, metaphorically and literally.

He flicked on his torch and shone it. He realized as soon as he brushed himself off and began to move cautiously in the space that it was vaulted and huge, the size of an underground cathedral or the Torchwood Hub itself. "What the hell . . .?" asked Jack, rubbing the back of his neck. He removed his gun from its holster and held it up just behind the ray of his torch. He scented the air for Weevils; he was definitely not in a mood to encounter them. He stepped around a corner, seeing what looked like an enormous plasma computer screen glowing neutrally. His footsteps sounded hollow, and there was a shiver in the air, like something was flying around, disturbing the atmosphere. The pterodactyl? Or another alien menace?

He heard the swish of the cape a second before the bulky yet lithe figure descended on him, knocking his gun across the room. Jack didn't take the full impact of the body-slam as he reacted a few tics before the body in a skin-tight black suit fell, but he was knocked over. Jack didn't have a chance to toss off his bulky WWII coat but neither had the figure—as tall as Jack and wearing some kind of resistant body armor—abandoned its cloak. The punches came fast and heavy—a trained fighter. A gymnast. An athlete. Smart, swift, brutal. Jack was feinting as many punches as he was doling out. His kicks weren't much good against the legs in the black lycra-like material: they rebounded back on him. Diving and rolling toward his gun didn't do much good either, as the attacker in black caught up every time.

Yet the flesh was human underneath the costume, and Jack could just make out a chiselled chin from beneath the half-mask the figure was wearing. Jack was panting, and he could hear his attacker grunting, winded, too. "Enough!" the man roared in a harsh voice. His hands were around Jack's throat and Jack was being lifted bodily into the air against the wall.

"Wait—wait—" he coughed out. "I can explain." He gave an askance look to the figure below him. "Batman?!"

Cue Torchwood Theme


	2. Chapter 2

Batman relaxed his grip around Jack's throat slightly and let him sink down to the floor. "Who are you?" he growled.

Jack struggled against the hold around his throat. "Captain Jack Harkness," he said. "Torchwood, Cardiff." No response. "The British government's answer to alien threats—keeping Earth safe from invasion." Batman released Jack and glared at him. Jack lifted one eyebrow. Who in Cardiff was impersonating Batman and digging out underground bases in Mermaid Quay?—it was absurd.

"Never heard of you." Batman stalked away from Jack toward the glowing plasma screen. His voice was rough, like ground-up glass, and Jack wasn't sure if he was supposed to be scared or amused. Jack took a good look, though, and realized whoever it was, he hadn't just walked over to the nearest fancy dress party shop and picked up some spandex. The body armor was real, the cape as flowing as a watercolor.

"Well, you wouldn't have, would you," laughed Jack nonchalantly, "since you inhabit a _fictional_ realm?" Batman chose to ignore this remark and sat down in the chair in front of the plasma screen and began typing. The thought of Batman typing was too much for Jack, and he gave himself a good slap across the face. Batman looked at him, and even from the distance Jack could feel the sarcasm.

"Do you have some identification on you?" asked Batman.

"Er," said Jack, fishing through his pockets. He found a driver's license. It would have to do. "Catch?" he asked. Batman caught it and stared at it. Then he switched on the lights.

Jack held his breath. If _this _was the Bat Cave . . . he began to gently tiptoe, wondering where he might find the Batmobile. Meanwhile Batman seemed quite happy to keep typing into the database. Jack saw the screen flash with the words _Oracle_ and sensed Batman's eyes on him even as the grown man dressed in a costume was turned away. "Quite a place you got here," Jack asked, absent-mindedly pinching himself. The computer was flashing and squeaking at Batman, so Jack kept walking around the lair. There was a spare Batsuit in a glass case and a huge metal drawer system that Jack expected didn't hold manila folders.

"Look," said Jack, biting back a laugh of hilarity and insanity, "all I'm looking for is my pterodactyl. I'll find her and be on my way. I didn't mean to barge in on your underground lair."

Batman got up and walked toward Jack. "Oracle says you check out." He handed Jack his ID back.

"Thanks," said Jack. "I'm glad a made-up man from a made-up city agrees that I'm legit."

"If I'm fictional, what does that make you?" asked Batman in his grating voice, this time his dark eyes piercing Jack's with a feeling that was not entirely pleasant.

"Touchy! Okay, I'm sorry about the jokes," began Jack, holding up his hands in surrender.

"If Cardiff is your city, and you protect it, how does that make me any less real than you? You came to find a pterodactyl, a species of flying reptile that's been extinct for millennia. You tell me who sounds like the madman."

Jack figured announcing he was from the enlightened 51st century might not be the tack to take. "Um, not sure what 'Oracle' told you, but I don't just protect Cardiff, Torchwood protects the whole planet. My file should say something about the Sycorax and the Racnoss and the Battle of Canary Wharf."

Jack wasn't sure how he knew this, but he could tell when Batman was raising an eyebrow. "Cybermen and Daleks? Gotham's too busy fighting home-grown psychotic criminals to have time for metal men from Mars."

"A parallel universe, actually, but that's a technicality. We've got home-grown psychotic criminals, too. Ever heard of a place called the Brecon Beacons?"

"There are military outposts there where the British Army trains."

Jack nodded. "Also dodgy Welsh cannibals. Don't ever go if you're planning a holiday."

"Seen my share of cannibals," said Batman with a shudder. "Mutilators, poisoners, paranoid schizophrenics, mob bosses—"

"Try wicked fairies from the dawn of time, Futurekind from the end of the world—"

"Fearmongers, sadists—"

"Corrupt Time Agents, water-dwelling aliens the size of tanks, reanimation—"

"Opportunists, greed, and suffering—"

"Okay!" Jack shouted. "I get it. I don't want to fight. I just want you to know that I'm _telling the truth._"

"So am I!" bellowed Batman.

Jack took a deep breath and held out his hand. "Truce? All I want is the pterodactyl that escaped from the Hub in Cardiff Bay."

"Why do you have a pterodactyl in your headquarters?"

Jack looked over Batman's shoulder. "For the same reason _you _have a life-sized T-rex in yours?"

Batman half-turned and smiled. "It's a defunct mechanical model. Long story.1" He seized Jack's hand and shook it. At that moment, the pterodactyl flew over their heads with a high-pitched shriek. Batman gasped. Jack grinned and ran after the prehistoric reptile as it circled and landed on the shoulder of the T-rex. "Oh, look, I think they're in love," said Jack.

"That's impossible," said Batman.

"Nothing's impossible, as my old friend the Doctor used to say," shouted Jack, running around the giant feet of the T-rex, trying to coax down the pterodactyl.

"You say you followed it down from Cardiff Bay?"

"Yes," said Jack, half-distracted by the pterodactyl's refusal to budge from the T-rex model. Batman waxed into a meditative silence as Jack began whistling at the pterodactyl.

"Try a pig call," suggested Batman.

Jack allowed himself a cautious smile. Was Batman making _jokes_? "By the way, _Bruce, _you can take your mask off. It's okay—I won't tell anyone."

Batman wasn't smiling. "How did you know who I was?"

"Er . . . it's in your file," Jack lied. "Hey, Caped Crusader, are you going to help me get my flying lizard or what?"

"My identity mustn't be leaked," said Batman solemnly. "It's the only weapon I've got in Gotham right now, my anonymity, and if I lose that—"

"Don't sweat it," said Jack, beginning to wish his flippancy away. "Jack Harkness," he said quietly, "isn't my real name. I _met _the real Jack Harkness. Handsome devil, good dancer, brave. Volunteer RAF pilot."

"In the Second World War?" asked Batman, voice tight, as if he didn't actually expect an answer.

"That's right," said Jack. "Suppose it said in my file that I'm a time traveller?"

Batman shook his head. "You're asking me to believe things that go against my entire conception of the world as I know it. You say Gotham doesn't exist, yet according to me, that's where we are, _right now._"

"Bruce," said Jack, "look at the pterodactyl. Broaden your horizons." He shrugged. "Or maybe both of us need a stiff drink."

"Yes, maybe," said Batman. "I'll go get us one."

Jack laughed. He couldn't believe it—having a drink in the Bat Cave? "Jack Daniels if you've got it," he tossed over his shoulder.

Suddenly Batman removed his mask and cowl, revealing a handsome face with high cheekbones and dark brown eyes. "I'll see what I can do."

Jack studied him with a grin. "And Bruce? Why are you hiding under that mask all the time? You are _quite _the looker."

Bruce Wayne looked down, not quite sure how to respond. "Er. Thanks. I guess."

1 See "Dinosaur Island," Batman Comic #256


	3. Chapter 3

When Bruce had returned with two glasses and a bottle of whiskey from the bemused Alfred, Jack was cheering like a cowboy. Bruce could see why: the pterodactyl was caught in a net that had been securely fastened against a bulkhead in the Bat Cave. Bruce frowned. "You made short work of it with the net-gun."

"Oh, yeah," said Jack, grinning. "I hope you don't mind, it was just there—"

"Torchwood doesn't equip you with all the latest gadgetry?"

"Oh, they do," said Jack, smiling, his blue eyes flashing. Bruce set the tray with the whiskey on it down beside the strange, grinning Captain Harkness. "Someone just chucked my gun across the super-smooth surface of the Bat Cave."

"Sorry about that."

"Not a problem." Jack picked up the whiskey bottle and poured them each a drink. "Cheers."

"Is there a reason," Bruce asked, "why you wear suspenders _and _a belt?"

Jack choked on his drink. "Braces and a belt, you mean?" He gave Bruce a devilish look. "To keep my trousers up, of course—I'm very careful. Though, if you knew me better, you'd maybe wonder _why _I wanted to . . ." The pterodactyl gave a forlorn cry. "Oh, be quiet, you. We'll have you home in two ticks."

He downed his whiskey as Bruce drank a bit more slowly. "Bruce! You changed into your civvies." For Bruce Wayne, a pair of jeans, black boots and a black button-up shirt were hardly civvies, but Bruce tipped his glass at Jack.

"I want to go up to the surface when you take the . . . when you go."

Jack wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. "Still don't trust me, eh?"

"If we're really in Cardiff, I'm going to need more than stiff drink."

"Okay," said Jack. "Fair enough. I'm ready when you are." Bruce finished his drink, and Jack took the edge of the netting, pulling the protesting pterodactyl along with him.

"How did you get into the Bat Cave in the first place?" asked Bruce, eyeing Jack. "Normally Alfred and I are the only ones with keys . . ."

"I'm not really sure," said Jack.

"How do you get to and from your Torchwood base? I assume it, too, is underground?"

"Best place to hide a secret organization, doncha think?"

"Okay, we'll take the elevator."

"You mean the lift."

Fortunately the elevator/lift was large enough to accommodate the very unhappy, squawking pterodactyl. Bruce still couldn't believe his eyes as he looked at the ancient beast in close quarters. He hoped Jack hadn't spotted him spitting out most of the whiskey when he wasn't looking. He couldn't afford to have even the slightest inhibition in his faculties, in case Jack wasn't what he said he was, was leading Bruce into a trap. True, Oracle _had _confirmed his identity, and Bruce got a good vibe. But, Batman had been known to be wrong before . . . This could be some kind of nerve toxin, another of the Scarecrow's tricks . . . or just the beginning stages of insanity.

Jack was tapping his ear-piece. "Ianto—come in. Ianto—are you there?"

"How many members in your organization?" asked Bruce casually.

Jack's normally jovial face turned sad, distraught, for a flickering instant. "We're actually recruiting at the moment. Feel like joining, Bruce?"

Bruce couldn't resist a chuckle. "No thanks. Got enough of my own problems."

They had reached the surface. Bruce motioned for Jack to walk out first. Jack bowed and motioned for him. Bruce insisted. Jack winked and half dragged, half pulled the reticent pterodactyl into the pitch-black street. Bruce followed. They looked, then looked back at each other. "Would it be in poor taste," said Jack, "to say I told you so?"

Bruce winced momentarily, then scratched his neck. "No, but it would make you look quite foolish." Jack frowned at him. "Sorry, Jack, but this is clearly Gotham."

Jack stared. "No, Bruce, it's clearly Cardiff. Gotham doesn't have an Altusso Building, a Welsh National Assembly Building, or ads for the Brains Brewery. At least not the last time I watched TV."

Bruce rounded on him. "What are you talking about? There's the Wayne Tower, there's MCU, there's the scaffolding for the new General Hospital . . ."

Jack squinted into the darkness and looked at Bruce like he was crazy. "Either we're both nuts or . . . ah ha!" Jack cried. Bruce backed away, startled and wary. "It's either something to do with the Rift—something that's pulling us through or pushing us or some instability—"

"The Space/Time Rift?" Bruce asked unsteadily, remembering reading about it from Oracle's file on Torchwood's Cardiff headquarters.

"Yes. Or it's some kind of perception filter."

"Chemical?"

Jack grinned. "Possibly. Or mechanically—sonically—induced. Bruce, concentrate really hard. Look right over there, and tell me whether you don't see a tall white building with a spire and a sort of halo shape sticking out of the top." Bruce, wondering whether it was foolish or not to do so, squinted at the big blank spot in the distance. He was glad he hadn't had that whiskey after all.

"Oh God," he heard himself groaning. "I _do _see something, very faint, as if something is forcing me _not _to see. Jack."

"All yours, buddy."

"Can you see scaffolding there? It's in the shape of a large rectangular building—the foundations have been laid—"

"What the hell happened to your hospital?" asked Jack, aghast.

"Another long story," said Bruce.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: **Some spoilers for season 4 from here on.

The Doctor stepped out of the TARDIS into the drab, uninteresting hallway. He untucked the paper invitation, soggy with tea stains, from his pinstripe jacket pocket, and fished out his glasses. He studied the invitation and looked at his wrist. There was no watch, and he furrowed his brow. "Right time," he said to himself, taking off his glasses and putting them away. "Right place, I think?"

He had wandered many, many corridors in his time, most of them drab and uninteresting, like this one. He could be anywhere, really, which gave him a bit of a pleasant jolt of comfort, considering. He needed a bit of stability in his life, with Donna . . . well, never mind. Water under the bridge, wasn't it?

"Window, I think," he announced to no one in particular and trod confidently in the direction of the nearest window, trainers squeaking on a particularly well-waxed floor. "Aha," he said, "I _could _be in the right place. Surely Arcadian art galleries are going to have more heavily waxed floors than your average anonymous corridor, aren't they?"

No one answered him, and he didn't expect anyone to. He thrust his forehead through the exceptionally high window and found not only was his face pressed up against glass, there were heavy metal bars beyond the door. "Definitely not Arcadia, then," he said solemnly.

"Freeze! Step away from the window!"

The Doctor cursed the faulty TARDIS coordinates for the billionth time and turned around slowly, his arms held up for good measure. He knew the drill. "Who are you? How did you get in here?" As usual, the person accosting the Doctor was in uniform, probably some sort of law enforcement official, though not holding a gun as such. The Doctor, hands still up, craned his neck for a better look at the officer's name tag.

Another officer rounded the corner and took a look at the parked TARDIS. "What the hell is that?" Then he looked at the Doctor. "Who's he?"

"Think about it, Porter," said the first officer who, from his name tag, the Doctor deduced was Richie. "See a guy wandering around the halls in _here, _no badge, no white lab coat—"

"I'm the Doctor, by the way," said the Doctor, flashing his most winning grin.

"Shut up!" Richie rudely ignored him and whipped out a weapon from his belt.

"Oh no, not a Tazer," the Doctor groaned, rolling his eyes.

"An . . . escapee?" Porter gulped, looking at Richie nervously.

"Trying to trick us," said Richie warningly over his shoulder, pointing the Tazer at the Doctor's head. "I read all about this in the manual. That's what they _do, _see, they mess with your head."

"Look, there's been a misunderstanding," said the Doctor in his most conciliatory voice.

"I said, shut up," said Richie, moving closer and taking one of the Doctor's arms. He twisted it behind the Doctor's back. "Come with us, and no funny business."

"I've materialized inside locked rooms before," said the Doctor. "I can explain everything."

"Porter, look in the records. See if there's an internee with a British accent." He brought out a pair of handcuffs and clinked them around the Doctor's wrists.

"Prince Charles, maybe?" chuckled Porter.

The Doctor, though not resisting Richie's grip on his arm, shook his head in abject disdain. "Oh no! Prince Charles?! Is that the best you can come up with? I've met Prince Charles, I'll have you know, _and _the Prince Regent, and the Artist Formerly Known As, everyone _but _the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and all _you_ can say is—"

Richie wrenched the Doctor's arm as they moved him swiftly through the corridors. "See, Porter? Tripping you out. All that psychosis. Technobabble."

Porter swiped a key card at an entry-way, and they shoved the Doctor through. "Will you at least tell me where we are?" asked the Doctor, quickly losing patience.

Porter and Richie laughed on cue. "If he don't know where he is," said Richie, "he don't really _want _to know."

Richie sat the Doctor down on a plain plastic chair in a small, metal-lined room. Clinical, no doubt associated with some kind of prison. Internee, they'd said. The Doctor sighed. He'd seen enough prisons before, too. "We gotta lock him up," said Porter, standing in front of a computer terminal and typing into it furiously. "That journalist is coming by for a tour today—if the DA's office finds out we have an internee unaccounted for, they'll hit the roof."

"By your accents, I'd say somewhere in the eastern United States," said the Doctor crisply. "Chicago, maybe? Boston? No, not Boston. New York?"

Porter and Richie ignored him. "Okay, we'll stash him in a free cell until we can figure out where he escaped from," said Richie. "Find an empty guest room, Porter—" Richie gave an ugly grin, accentuated by his collection of gold teeth, "and we'll figure out the logistics later."

"It's definitely Earth, early twenty-first century," the Doctor went on.

"There ain't no open cells!" cried Porter in a panic. "We're operating at over 100 capacity as it is."

Richie shoved the Doctor's head against the back of his chair nonchalantly and went over to the computer screen. "You did not just do that," said the Doctor ominously, rubbing the nape of his neck.

"Arkham Asylum, _my _jurisdiction, pal," said Richie, pointing his Tazer again as the computer screen whined and hummed.

"Even if you _hadn't _heard of the Shadow Proclamation or the Geneva Convention," said the Doctor acidly, "_where_ver we are, there's got to be some version of the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of Human Rights—"

"Look, Block E," said Richie. "There's one empty cell."

Porter popped his tongue in his cheek. "We can't put him there."

"Why not?"

"Oh, don't listen to him, Porter," said the Doctor. "You don't have to put me in there. I'll very quietly slip back into my TARDIS, I'll invite you in for a cup of tea, we'll talk this over like civilized people—" he clinked his handcuffs meaningfully. "What do you say?"


	5. Chapter 5

The Doctor was shouting at the top of his lungs, not at all concerned by the savage threats and foul language that was raining on him from either side as Porter and Richie dragged him into the open cell in Block E. "This is a gross abuse of—"

"You'll pipe down if you know what's good for you," said Porter, as he swiped his card in the door, then unlocking it with a huge set of keys. "These guys in here, they ain't as nice as we are."

Porter accentuated this portentous statement with a harsh laugh, shoving the Doctor between the shoulder blades into the cell. He quickly unlocked the handcuffs before stepping out of the cell and locking the door behind him. "_Wait _a minute!" shouted the Doctor, thrusting his head against the bars that were his only window to the corridor in Block E.

"Just cool down, English," said Richie over his shoulder. "If you're not as crazy as the rest of them, you'll be fine—we'll be back to get you real soon." _Sotto voce, _he added to Porter, "If he's still in one piece. Anyone who goes in this place ain't crazy to begin with sure as hell _gets _crazy."

The Doctor banged angrily on the cell bars until Porter and Richie disappeared from view. He grunted in frustration before slapping his forehead frenziedly. "Think, think, think. They said Arkham Asylum. That sounds vaguely familiar, but I can't place it. I'm in Bedlam but not Bedlam."

"You don't know about Arkham?" asked a cool male voice from the cell on the Doctor's left. "I thought everyone knew about Arkham. I used to work here."

"Used to?" echoed the Doctor, searching through the pockets of his long brown coat.

The voice was genuinely curious. "Who are you? What are you doing here?"

"I'm the Doctor," said the Doctor, digging deep into his pockets. "I've just been thrown in a cell because I happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Happens quite often, I'm afraid."

The Doctor could imagine the owner of the voice sitting up to hear him better. "You're a doctor? So am I, or I was. Dr. Crane," he said.

"Of all the times to lose the sonic!" the Doctor exasperated, before adding, "Nice to meet you, Dr. Crane. There a lot of doctors locked up in here?"

"Some," said Crane. "It _is _like an authoritarian regime to gather up all its free-thinkers and scientists and hide them away, though, isn't it?"

The Doctor stopped rummaging around his pockets long enough to sigh and ruffle through his already untidy hair. "Yes, I suppose it is. Are you saying you've been unjustly imprisoned as well?"

"What reason did they give for locking you up?"

"They thought I'd escaped from already being incarcerated. That was the reasoning they _gave, _anyway," said the Doctor, tossing a pile of sweets wrappers onto the floor of the bare cell. "Tell me, Dr. Crane, what does your cell look like? Posh, is it?"

"If by posh you mean it's got four metallic walls, a toilet, a sink, a mattress, and a book shelf, then, yes, it is."

The Doctor quirked a half-smile. "Same as mine, then. I take it this is the high-security wing of the asylum?" He tossed out a ball of yarn from his pocket and then dove in deeper, retrieving a rubber duckie, some rocks, and a Slinky.

"Are you trying to escape, Doctor? No one gets out of Block E without outside help."

The Doctor removed a metallic object, about the size of a key card, along with some lint, from his trouser pocket. "I just happen," he said, "to have something along those lines."

The cool, clinical voice from the Doctor's left was sounding more and more animated. "I hope you're not going to keep it all to yourself."

The Doctor was fishing around in his pockets for paper clips, which he was connecting by the dozens in a long chain. He didn't quite trust this Dr. Crane, not by a long shot, but it was best to keep him talking—maybe he'd find out something interesting or useful. "Tell me, what's Arkham like?"

"Arkham?" Crane asked, sounding confused. "What do you mean?"

"Is it a big city? It must be, to have a facility like this for its mentally ill."

Crane laughed, and his voice bore a trace of superiority. "You're confused. Arkham isn't the name of the city."

The Doctor rolled his eyes and began untying one of his trainers. He sat down gingerly on the poorly maintained mattress in his cell and began removing both shoes. "Why's it called Arkham, then?"

"It's named after its founder, Dr. Arkham."

"Then what's the _city _called?" Really, for a doctor, this Crane bloke was a bit thick.

"Gotham," said Crane cautiously.

The Doctor laughed. "Oh, good one, Dr. Crane, you almost had me going." The Doctor took out a microchip from inside one of his socks and plugged it into the metallic object and connected it to the paper clip chain.

"How's the escape attempt going?"

"_Molto bene,_" said the Doctor, tongue escaping the corner of his mouth as he looked down on his creation, deeply concentrating.

"Doctor, I know we've just met, but, are you going to take me with you when you escape?"

"Generally I find that patients in asylums have been put there for a reason."

"You weren't." The Doctor shrugged. Maybe he had a point. "Is there anything I can do to help? I _do _have a degree in pharmopsychology."

"Yeah, but how many times have _you _watched _The Great Escape_?"

The Doctor began whistling the theme tune to the aforementioned movie as he continued to dump things from his pockets onto the floor. "First tennis racket, from the court of François I," he muttered, tossing the racket against the wall on his right. "Ah, and the first _ball, _as well," he said, grinning, bouncing it against the wall and back again. "Hey, that could be useful."

"What are you doing?" asked Crane, his voice rising in alarm.

"Oh, nothing," said the Doctor, hitting the ball back and forth against the wall. "Just getting a bit of exercise . . ."

"You might want to do that against another wall," said Crane, "you might wake him up—"

"Who, him?" asked the Doctor facetiously.

"Crane," snapped a voice from the Doctor's right-hand neighbor. "Are you talking to yourself again?"

"It's not me," Crane stammered. "I got moved, remember."

"Hello," said the Doctor cheerfully to his neighbor's wall. "My name's the Doctor, and you are . . .?"

"Trying to get some sleep, if you don-tttt mind."

The Doctor put the racket and ball back down.

"He's going to escape," said Crane, his voice equal measures of sarcasm and eagerness. "He says he's got outside help."

"Oooh-heee-hah," laughed the voice with a serious lack of conviction. "What planet are _you _from, Doc? No one escapes from Block E, didn't they tell you that?"

"Actually . . ." began the Doctor, pulling out another component to his swiftly advancing array of machines.

"He's not from around here." The Doctor's neighbor on the right made a meditative smacking noise, though the Doctor was at a loss to explain why or how.

"There seem to be a rash of perfectly decent scientists getting locked up," said the Doctor, garrulously and not entirely insincerely. "Don't tell me you're a doctor too."

"Nope," said the voice. The Doctor imagined its owner getting up off the mattress in the adjoining cell and moving closer to the Doctor's shared wall. "An artist, actually, an _en_tertainer."

"Oh?" said the Doctor, only half listening.

"He'll make you laugh, no doubt about it," said Crane in an odd, heady-sounding voice.

"Soooooo—Doc. You gonna share with us your plaaaan?" The Doctor stopped what he was doing and became as silent as possible, scratching the back of his neck. "I see. You. Don't. Trust. Us."

There was something very charismatic about his neighbor, the Doctor thought, and yet he couldn't shake off the feeling that something sinister was at work. "Weeeelll, it's nothing personal," he said. "We've only just met, and we haven't actually even done that face-to-face."

There was a very loud crash to his right. "Oh, now you've done it," said Crane.

"Dr. Crane, what was THAT?"

"I think that was the J—I mean, your neighbor picking up his mattress and hurling it across the room."

"What did I say to provoke that?!" asked the Doctor, wiping off his glasses irritatedly on a corner of his jacket.

"Speaking as one doctor to another, your neighbor over there has real self-image issues."

"Oh, why?"

"He's never been able to get over the isolation resulting from very serious facial disfiguration."

"What kind of facial disfiguration?"

"The PHAN-tom of the OP-e-RA is here . . ." the Doctor's neighbor bellowed.

"You're not making this easy," said Crane acidly.

"He hasn't even seen the scars," said the Doctor's neighbor, "and you're diagnosing them clinically and cleanly, Crane. They're _mine, _and if anyone's going to talk about them, it's gonna be me!"

"Are we talking little scars," asked the Doctor, intrigued despite himself, "or--?"

"Have you heard of something called a Glasgow grin?" asked Crane. "Or perhaps you've heard of it called a Chelsea grin?" asked Crane coldly. "You're a pretty learned man by the sounds of it, but in case you haven't, it occurs when the attacker takes a knife to the corner of the victim's mouth and cuts—"

"I know what that is!" snapped the Doctor. He shuddered. "What human would do that to another?" He frowned in disgust at the wall.

"Crane, what time is it?"

"After nine PM. Why do you ask?"

"Plenty of time before breakffffast. To tell the story. Or escape. Whichever happens first." Then he addressed himself to the Doctor. "Now. Doc-tirrrr. Do you have a last name there, Doc?"

"No, actually."

The Doctor's neighbor laughed, this time with genuine amusement. "Oooh, I just _love_ one-word titles, myself. Anyway, let me tell you the story. Feel free to carry on in your no-doubt intellectually riveting escape plan.

"My father was born in a little town in the middle of nowhere. The most exciting pastimes there are tipping cows and eating pork. He never had money growing up, and he never expected to get anywhere in life. Are you with me here, Doc?"

"Yeah, carry on."

"Well, one day he gets the opportunity to travel to far-off places, see things he never would have, encounter situations no one in his town had ever even dreamed of." The Doctor stopped wiring the paper clips together. This sounded like Donna's story. Impossible. He shook his head, but he couldn't remove from his mind's eye the image of the fiery red-haired temp from Chiswick, one of the most eager and passionate travellers of them all. Who had saved the universe. Who had saved his life more times than he could count. Who was gone now, only a memory in the minds of a few disparate people scattered throughout the galaxy . . .

"Well, of course he goes, and it's every bit as eye-opening as you might expect. But eventually he has to come home. He's got a family to take care of, a mother and a grandfather, and by this time he had met my mother. But he's still got these notions that are much bigger than the town. Notions that won't be stamped out. You see, Doc? He'd already seen the world, and it had clamped down on him like a disease. It wasn't going to let him be the same again."

The Doctor cleared his dry throat. "I thought this story was about scars."

"I'm getting to that. Now, I think you'll agree with me that it's human nature to want to mold the environment to suit our needs. So, my father, he thought he could change the town into the things he had seen abroad. So he ran for mayor. And what do you know, he got elected? This was the year I was born. Things were going geeee-reat. But then Pops digs too deep, scales too high, and that town breaks him. He moves to this city, and the only work he can find is as a janitor. Talk about your soul-crushing.

"He dies, embittered and disillusioned. But me, I'm gonna be different. I'm gonna change this city so that the individual is celebrated, not the mob mentality, not the boring types in their suits who are yakking on their phones all day. But this city just won't tolerate it. It is uniformly opposed to distinctive opinions. It's got a, a, a quarantine on soap boxes. Isn't that right, Crane?"

"Yep."

"You try to stand up against homogenization in this city, Doc, and you get your face cut up. You can't, er, see it, my fffffface, but if you could, it would be eloquent enough."

The Doctor took several deep breaths. The Daleks had wanted standardization, rule for Daleks alone, at the cost of genocide to a thousand species. The Cybermen believed they were doing worlds a favor by cybernization. To rid the universe of emotion and what they saw as weakness. There were countless examples through the millennia of the oppression the Doctor's nameless neighbor had described. Taken at face value, the Doctor would be hard-pressed not to support a resistance movement against a totalitarian regime of this magnitude. And yet, something was not quite right. Unless he was in a parallel version of Earth, there hadn't been a regime this uncompromising except on Varos, and far in this Earth's future. He had a feeling there was a huge piece of the puzzle he was not being privy to. But his conscience refused to allow him to stand by in the face of such obvious human suffering. Even in Bedlam in 1599 he had seen at least to Peter Cook's comfort in the barbaric excuse for an asylum. But then again, he hadn't gone and freed all those "mad-people."

"Tell us, Doc," said the seductive and amused voice on the other side of the wall, "how are you planning to get out of here?"

"Key card opens the door," said the Doctor briskly, "so I make a fake key card thrown together from bits and bobs—no problem. No sonic screwdriver for the regular key lock, but a plain old lock pick, with some adjustments, will do. Cameras in the corridor, right? No scarf like in the old days, but a static reaction with magnets made from paper clips should short out the TVs, at least for a few minutes."

"And the guards?"

"My dashing good looks? Oh, I don't know," said the Doctor. "I can run quite fast. All I have to do is get to the TARDIS anyway and—"

"Crane, should we tell him?"

"Doctor," said Crane, "we've been a bit disingenuous with you. We've actually been planning our escape for several weeks. That's why they moved our cells away from each other."

"Oh?"

"We've got—er—friends who can get us out of Arkham itself—"

"We just hadn't quite gotten to the cell-escape bit yet," said the Doctor's neighbor on the right, suddenly sounding excited and feral. "No access to explosives—"

"So," interrupted Crane, "if you get us out of our cells, we'll take you with us out of Arkham itself."

The Doctor considered. He didn't really want to tell them that he didn't need to get outside of Arkham, just into the TARDIS—and that name was bothering him, _where _had he heard it before?—but to quibble on this point would be cowardly. "Well, since you've invited me to join the Arkham E Block Escapees Club," he babbled, "it would be terribly bad manners of me to refuse.

"Right," said the Doctor. "If you've got your bags packed, let's blow this popsicle stand."

"Oooh, nice choice of phrasing, don't you think, Crane?" Crane groaned. "And Doc-tirrrr?"

"Yes?"

"You're not planning to just get yourself out and leave us in here as soon as you see the outside again? 'Cause we've been in here an _aw_fully long time, and that kind of incarceration will do things to a person." The Doctor shivered, recalling what Porter and Richie had alluded to. "I don't know," he laughed jumpily, "we might just go off the deep end and try to kill ourselves, right, Crane?"

"Any more Arkham food and I might."

"I'm not leaving without you," said the Doctor softly. "We've all been imprisoned here unjustly, and I'm going to see that this situation gets dealt with. Properly."

"Ooooh," the Doctor's scarred friend giggled, "I can tell I'm _really _going to like you!"


	6. Chapter 6

The Doctor was always a bit touch-and-go as far as plans went, so he was rather pleasantly surprised by the fact that getting open the door to his cell in Block E did not trigger any alarms or flashing lights. Likewise he was pleasantly surprised there were no guards like the malevolent morons Richie and Porter about. However, he knew he had to be quick, as his taking out of the camera monitors would not go unnoticed, and a stir was already rising among the other internees.

He let out Crane first. Crane was tall and emaciated, incredibly pale under the harsh fluorescent lighting, and possessed of devious blue eyes, at once haughty and deeply intelligent. "Nice to meet you at last, Doctor," he said, offering his hand to shake. Both reached into their pockets—Crane into the light blue of his Arkham uniform, the Doctor into the brown pinstripe of his suit—and put on their glasses. "Now let's get out of here."

"Wait, what about . . .?" The Doctor paused, remembering that the other prisoner had never said his name.

"Listen," whispered Crane, taking the Doctor by the arm, "maybe we should just go . . .?"

The Doctor turned, horrified at this betrayal, and saw genuine fear on Crane's face. The cell next to the Doctor's rattled its bars. "Crane, ol' buddy ol' pal," came the nasal voice from within, "you weren't thinking of leaving without me, were ya?!" The Doctor, still looking at Crane, opened the lock as Crane made an "I-wash-my-hands-of-this" gesture.

"Hellloooooo, Doctor!" Before the Doctor quite knew what was happening, a tall, broad-shouldered man had barrelled out of the cell and seized his arm, pumping it between two of his hands. The face beneath the longish, lank hair was grinning, and beneath the perpetual mutilation, the grin was even more complete. "It feels good to be back!" the smiling prisoner declared loudly before turning on Crane. "You thought you were going to get to leave without me," he sing-songed.

"Not at all," said Crane, attempting dignity.

As the still-nameless prisoner lunged at Crane, the Doctor dove between them and shouted, "Gentlemen! And I hope that _is _the right title for you two, I'm beginning to wonder. Shall we get going?"

"Doc! You're a lot prettier than I imagined!"

"Pretty . . ." the Doctor muttered to himself. Crane had already begun sprinting down the corridor, and the Doctor followed.

"Sorry, I didn't properly introduce myself back there. Certain members of the press have dubbed me the Joker, and our gangly friend there is known as the Scarecrow." The Doctor quirked an eyebrow. "And you're THE Doctor. I bet people are always getting their definite articles confused when talking about you. All part and parcel to the _job_, isn't it, Ichabod?"

No one's mouth ever moved as fast as the Doctor's, and as he was trying to run and process the strange creature with the unavoidably atrocious scars and the sunken, dark-circled eyes, he found himself wondering if he had done something very bad. "Er—okay," he managed.

"Do you fix people? Do you make them better?" the Joker asked in an unbearably sweet voice. "What is it that you _do_?"

"I'm a traveller," the Doctor said uneasily. Rounding a corner, he almost bumped into Crane as the trio registered a group of guards at the end of the corridor.

"Not the Tazer, not the Tazer!" screamed Crane. The Doctor's skin crawled as he heard the Joker laugh.

"Now don't panic," the Doctor said as Crane hid behind him. The Doctor panted to catch his breath. "Let's just turn around and go the other way . . ."

The Joker grabbed the Doctor's upper arm. They were roughly the same height, and the Doctor found staring into the glassy eyes unnerving. The Master had once had eyes like that . . . "Got a pen, Doc? Preferably a fountain pen?" Absent-mindedly, the Doctor picked out a Mont Blanc from within his breast pocket, which the Joker took. He walked toward the guards with the pen tucked away in the uniform as the Doctor and Crane watched with horrified fascination.

"Okay, okay, you win," said the Joker in a grovelling tone, holding up his hands. "It was this misguided idealist Doctor over here, he totally had Crane and me brainwashed. Charismatic, y'see, and not bad-looking either."

"What?!" cried the Doctor.

"So you've gotta believe me, guys, when I tell you it was peer pressure."

"What?!" cried the Doctor.

"Stay _back," _shouted one of the guards. He handed his Tazer to the man behind him and held out a gun, which he cocked immediately. "We're authorized to shoot on sight—"

"No!" screamed the Doctor as the Joker ripped across the guard's throat with the pen and grabbed his gun, mowing down the other guards until he, and at the end of the corridor, the Doctor and Crane, were the only ones left standing.

"Let's get out of here," said Crane, tugging on the Doctor's sleeve. He ran, though first the Doctor fixed the Joker with a burning stare.

The Joker burst into frenzied laughter. "Ooops!"

The Doctor had no idea how he was going to atone for the appalling lapse in judgment. He still didn't remember from where he had heard the word Arkham, or why the alias the Joker sounded familiar, or how he had been so utterly duped by someone as devious, as cold-blooded, as the Master, as insane, as violent, as Davros. He was running, though, with one thought in mind: getting to the TARDIS, and finding some way of recapturing these felons he'd been manipulating into breaking out. He was skidding toward the ship when he felt a tap on his shoulder. When he turned, Crane smashed his fist into the Doctor's face with enough force to knock him out.

As he went under, the last thing the Doctor heard was the Joker cackling, "Gotham is _ours_."


	7. Chapter 7

In the midst of all the perversity going on, Jack had almost forgotten about the pterodactyl he was tugging along at the end of a short leash. Both he and Bruce Wayne jumped as the animal gave a terrified shriek. It began to struggle in its net, clipping the heavy fibre with its long, sharp beak. "Hey, hey," said Jack, "you'll wake the whole town! Stop that!"

"Yes, but _which _one?" asked Bruce Wayne with a smile.

"Very funny," said Jack, not meaning it.

A crackly voice sounded on his ear-piece. "Jack? Jack, are you there?"

"Gwen!" shouted Jack. "Boy, am I ever glad to hear your voice!"

Bruce whipped around and gave Jack a curious lift of his brow. The pterodactyl continued to struggle, and Bruce moved closer to it, holding up his arms and making soothing noises. "Where _are _you, Jack?" came Gwen's concerned voice. "Have you noticed—there's been an unusual amount of Rift activity. In fact, it's off the scale."

"I'm in Mermaid Quay—I think," said Jack, eyes moving uneasily to Bruce and the ever-skittish pterodactyl. Jack scratched his head at the sight.

"Well, you'd better get the hell away from there," said Gwen from the Hub. "That whole area's about to blow up." Jack heard the tapping of keys. "Seriously, Jack, get back here _now." _

"You don't have to tell me twice," said Jack. He patted Bruce on the arm and was about to ask him to set off in a jog toward the Bay. Then Jack's wrist-device began to sear his flesh. He cried out at the same time the pterodactyl launched itself from its casing and began to fly away with a scream that deafened both men. "Get down!" Jack cried, throwing himself at Bruce. They both fell as a flash of bluish energy singed the air above their heads. The pterodactyl disappeared soundlessly into a wave of bright light. The ground beneath Jack and Bruce rumbled as if the foundations of the city were being shifted.

"Earthquake?" Bruce managed to ask.

"No, that's the Rift," said Jack with a manic grin.

And as quickly as it had come, the Rift spike was gone. They were returned to a quiet Cardiff night, though all the car alarms in the city were going off, as well as about fifteen barking dogs. Jack looked up and saw no sign of the pterodactyl. But then he realized that there was no sign of the Wayne Building, the new hospital Bruce had pointed out, the Gotham city skyline that had been superimposed on the Cardiff docks area moments before. Jack shook his head. He was free of the perception filter—but was Bruce?

"Jack! Jack! Answer me!" It was Gwen on the ear-piece.

Jack got to his feet, cracking his neck, and helped Bruce. Bruce picked up the netting and stared at it. "Gwen, we're on our way."

Ignoring her protests about who the "we" was, Jack pointed to the Wales Millennium Centre and Roald Dahl Plas in the Bay. The burnished silvery sculpture with the constant waterfall was glowing in the moonlight. "Torchwood," he said.

Bruce goggled. "But where—where's Gotham gone?" he asked. "I don't understand."

"Frankly, neither do I," said Jack, at least satisfied that Bruce was on the same page. "So we're going to the Hub to find some answers. And some coffee."

"Whiskey not doing it for you?" asked Bruce, walking in a circle to pan a 360-degree view of Cardiff, marvelling, now the one doing the pinching.

Jack sincerely wished now he'd taken the SUV so he could show it off to Batman—it was no Batmobile, it was true, but it would have been a bit more glamorous than hotfooting it. Nevertheless, he waved Bruce on. "This way."

* * *

Bruce Wayne expected to find himself waking from a dream every few seconds. He had heard of UK-based organizations that dealt with extraterrestrial attack, Oracle had been plain as day about the existence of Torchwood, UNIT, and Captain Jack Harkness, but he found his belief growing ever more tenuous. He hoped Gwen Cooper in the so-called Torchwood Hub might be able to shed some light on the Time/Space Rift and why it might be targeting Gotham. He didn't feel easy leaving the city for very long with all the criminal activity he'd seen that summer. He trusted Jack, in so far as he was able to accept him as a human being and not a figment of his imagination, but the whole situation was unsettling at the very least.

"That building is the Hub?" he asked.

"That's the Wales Millennium Centre," said Jack, concealing a chuckle. "We can go see _Turandot _there tomorrow night if you'd like."

"I'd love to," said Bruce, gritting his teeth. Jack's endless humor was wearing on Bruce's already frayed nerves.

Jack cleared his throat. "Sorry." He checked that no one was looking before they began to be lowered down into the Hub from the flat oval basin.

"Now this is more like it," said Bruce as they descended into the Torchwood tunnels. The Hub entrance rolled back, and Bruce stood admiring the vast work space, lit with the brightest technology and things even _he_'d never seen before. Maybe he could persuade Torchwood to make a loan of equipment to Wayne Enterprises . . .

A dark-haired woman in a jacket and jeans strode past him, gave him a look, and then expended some fury on Jack. "You were nearly killed, do you know that?"

"Gwen . . ."

"What do you think you were doing?"

"I was looking for the pet pterodactyl," said Jack.

Gwen looked at Bruce. "Who's this, then?"

"Gwen Cooper, Bruce Wayne." Gwen took Bruce's proffered hand with a weak, jittery smile, looking at Jack as if a private joke were passing between them. "He's here in his _official capacity," _said Jack.

"Oh, I see," said Gwen, not giving any indication that she did.

"Where's Ianto?" Jack asked, striding through the Hub and depositing his bulky WWII coat on a coat-rack.

"I thought he was with you," said Gwen, following Jack toward his office. "What's going on, Jack?"

Jack ignored her and began racing and back through the Torchwood hallways, shouting, "Ianto? Ianto? Iaaaaaaantoooooo?!"

Gwen turned to Bruce with a smile. "Sorry. Would you like to take a seat?" He followed her example. She yawned. "Did Jack already offer you coffee? Normally that's Ianto's job, but . . ."

"He did, and yes, if you have some handy," said Bruce. Gwen cocked her head to the side and studied him. She handed him a coffee cup with a red dragon on the side of it and poured him hot coffee directly from the pot. She poured herself some in a cup whose slogan said Vote Saxon. "Do you normally work this late?"

"Part of the job description," said Gwen with a grin. She sipped the coffee cautiously. "A bit different from when I was a plain PC . . ."

"Police Constable?" asked Bruce, absorbing the thick muck. Whatever Gwen Cooper's talents, Bruce Wayne didn't think much of her coffee-making skills. "You started out in the Cardiff City police department?"

"Oh yes," said Gwen. "My friend Andy is still in it. Had its moment, so it did. Mind you, after seeing what we do, you couldn't go back—not really." She squinted at him. "What about you? Are you a cop?"

Bruce choked on his coffee. "No. I thought Jack would have explained—"

"UNIT, then?" Gwen asked.

Jack came barrelling back into the room, rubbing his hands together. "No sign of Ianto, unexplained and violent Rift activity, a missing pterodactyl; what else do we need to make our night complete?"

Gwen stood up and crossed her arms. "Surge in Weevil movement in Butetown, Grangetown, St. Mellons . . . we're even getting reports of them in Swansea."

Jack made a face. "Oh, _so_ not my problem."

"Infestation trouble?" asked Bruce.

Jack smiled and beckoned Bruce over to his computer monitor. "I'll explain later. Gwen, can you bring up the data on the Rift activity? It's more than simple power surges this time—there's a perception filter . . ." he paused. "And there seems to be more than the usual range of transportation abilities."

Gwen typed frenziedly. "I can try to bring it up, Jack, but I'm no . . ." She looked down guiltily. They both looked over at a small snapshot of a young Japanese woman, taped to the monitor.

"Only the three of you?" asked Bruce.

Gwen's face fell. "Well, for right now."

"Maybe I can help?" asked Bruce, moving from his chair and leaning over the monitor with the other two.

"Bruce Wayne, computer expert!" said Gwen cheerfully.

"Among other things," said Jack.


	8. Chapter 8

When the Doctor awoke, he was distinctly uncomfortable in every way possible. He knew right away he had been separated from his TARDIS, that he was tied up, and not only was his sprawled inelegantly on the floor, the floor was _moving. _A constant in his life was being tied up, and in some sense he was used to it. He was usually able to get free eventually. What concerned him more was _who _had tied him up. He didn't have to wonder for long.

"Doctor, let me offer my sincere apology for hitting you." The voice was Dr. Crane's, and the Doctor noted he was lying on what appeared to be the flat bed of a mack truck/lorry with Crane leaning over him. Except now Crane was wearing a charcoal-colored suit. And a burlap sack over his head. "It was the only way I could think to detain you, so the Joker and I could express our appreciation for your help in the escape."

The Doctor studied the sack. It had eyes cut out where Crane's dead blue ones were now staring out with an insane smile. The face of the sack was carved up like a scarecrow. Ah. The Scarecrow. "I'm very relieved to have the opportunity of being thanked by a clown with a paper bag over his head."

There was a horrible hooting laughter from the back of the truck, and the purple-clad figure the Doctor supposed must be the Joker turned. The Doctor recoiled. He had changed into a garish purple coat and with the purple pinstripe trousers, it was almost a parody of the Doctor's own suit. Worst of all, he'd daubed his scarred face in white paint with black smirched around his eyes and a gruesome, exaggerated smile of painted red. The Doctor's lip curled in disgust. The Joker, however, just laughed.

"Doc! Did you say something about clowns?"

"I knew you were disturbed," said the Doctor. "I just didn't realize quite how much."

"Maybe," said the Joker, leaning down next to the Doctor and stabbing a purple-gloved finger in his face. "But _you _are the one who freed us, isn't that right, Crane?"

"That's right," said the emaciated psychologist.

"I think he felt sorry for us," said the Joker. "Was that it, Dooooooc? Was your heart just bleeding for us?"

The Doctor edged away as best he could. "You lied to me."

The Joker squealed with laughter and began kicking around on the floor of the truck like a child agonized with laughter. "Oooh-hooooo! Listen to this! And I thought HAHH-very was fun to bait. Batman will be _so _happy to find out the person who busted us out of Arkham was a do-gooder with a conscience to rival his own."

The Doctor gritted his teeth. Batman? Was the clown absolutely out of touch with reality? What had they said—Gotham was the city where Arkham was located? Was the Doctor just going mad? Was he having a horrible nightmare? Was this a trick of the Celestial Toymaker's? He glared at the Joker, who was still quivering with laughter, and Crane in turn, and wondered if it was worth provoking them to their utmost. Why hadn't they just killed him like they had killed the guards? They obviously had no compunction about taking life. What was their plan? What did they want?

The Doctor inhaled and managed a charming smile. Despite the carnage he had witnessed, he must not let them see that they'd gotten to him. "You do manage to travel in style, don't you? Where are we headed? St. Tropez? Jamaica? I've heard Lanzarote is lovely this time of year."

"A vacation is definitely on the horizon," said Crane. "But first we have to have money."

"Oh, I see," said the Doctor. "And what's your line of work, exactly? Bank robberies? Jewel thefts? Drugs?"

The Joker gave Crane a warning look and reached deeply into the pocket of his coat. "I dunno, Doc, I found something on the floor that might sell. Whaddya think?"

He flashed the sonic screwdriver right under the Doctor's nose. "Oh, _no,_ not the sonic!" the Doctor cried, struggling to get to his feet despite his bonds. "Where did you find that?!" He shuddered to think the Joker might have been going through his clothes! "Give—it—back!"

The Joker licked his lips. "Or _what_?"

The Doctor seethed, growling in frustration. Oooh, if he just wasn't tied up—some Venusian karate might come in handy in a situation like this. He began pacing the truck, wondering for the billionth time where they were going and when he might have a chance to escape. When he turned back, Crane and the Joker were studying him. "What?!" he snapped.

"What do you think?" the Joker asked Crane, _sotto voce_. "Do you think he's got the same r-r-r-rules as Battsy Fattsy?" Crane shrugged. The Joker lunged forward and grabbed the Doctor by the collar. "Okay, Doc, you can have your sex toy back—"

"_Sonic screwdriver!" _the Doctor snapped.

"—but ya gotta come and get it." He gave the Doctor a shove. The Doctor landed painfully against the front end of the truck. The Joker came toward him with a gleaming knife. The Doctor met his gaze coolly and didn't blink. The Joker leaned in and cut the Doctor's bonds and then shoved the knife into his hand.

"What am I supposed to do with this?" asked the Doctor, bewildered.

The Joker held up the sonic screwdriver. "Simple. Take—it—from—me."

The Doctor shook his head. "Nuh-uh. Mind games don't work on me. Two against one, never encouraging odds. How do I know you don't have fifty more knives hidden away?"

The Joker chewed his lip. "I'll empty out my pockets if you empty out yours."

"Come on," said Crane. "This is going to go on forever."

"Shut it, Crane!" the Joker snarled without even turning around.

The Doctor looked down at the knife in his hand and up and the sonic screwdriver. "Are you _looking _for pain? Is _that _what you're about? Are you one of those sad people who could never get a girlfriend?"

"On the contrary," purred the Joker, smoothing back his greasy hair with his free hand. "They do say every girl crazy 'bout a sharp-dressed man." He cracked his neck.

The Doctor made a face. "Oh, _that _is just minging. Yuck."

The Joker placed the sonic screwdriver under the toe of his boot. "_Now_ will ya try to get it back?"

The Doctor's eyes were molten. He threw himself forward and held the knife up against the flesh of the Joker's neck, where the white paint had rubbed off. "_Do _it," said the Joker. He showed his yellow teeth. "Cut, and slice, and stab. You _know _that if you let me go, I'm just going to cause you problems. I'll be there, trying to blow up all of your little friends, taking innocent lives, and annoying the hell out of you. So just—do. _It_."

The Doctor grimaced, his hand trembling. He tossed the knife into the pocket of his jacket at the same moment he sprang away and began to unlock the rolling door. "Let him go," urged Crane. "He'll never survive a fall from this thing."

"There's something you should know about me. Faced with fighting or running away—I run away every time," said the Doctor breathlessly, leaping up to hang from the handles on the side of the truck as he kicked the sliding door open. Pavement flashing by at a hundred miles an hour was his backdrop.

"You're not performing according to _plan_," said the Joker, trying to grab the Doctor and succeeding in removing one of his trainers. The Doctor gave him a hard kick in the chest with his other foot that sent the Joker sprawling against the other side of the truck.

"Whoooooaaaaaa!" the Doctor cried as the truck went careening to a halt that sent the entire body of the vehicle wheeling in the opposite direction. Hanging on for dear life, the Doctor flew half in, half out of the truck, waving one stocking-footed foot helplessly. The truck groaned and nearly flipped, the tarmac smoking as metal and rubber sparked. At last the bent and mangled truck came to a screeching halt. The Doctor half jumped, half fell onto the pavement. He looked out on the highway and hesitated for a split second. As the blinding force of two headlights sieved the tarmac inches away from the truck, the Doctor shouted, "Get out! Get out!"

The Joker and Crane reacted when they heard the honk of a car horn. All three leapt from the truck as a National Express coach stopped just feet from smashing into it. They flew over the guard rail and into the bushes on the side of the highway, hearing the screams of the National Express passengers. "Did you do that on purpose?!" the Doctor shouted at the Joker.

"He saved our _lives_!" the Joker babbled, grabbing Crane by the lapels and shaking him. Crane seemed slightly dazed and didn't respond. "My hero!"

"What?!" asked the Doctor, stalking his way toward the ruined truck and then back again, running a hand agitatedly through his hair. "The M4?"

There was an inhuman growl from behind them, deep in the undergrowth. "What was that?" the Joker tittered. "A welcoming committee?"

The Doctor, still desperately looking toward the National Express coach and back again, moved cautiously toward the sound. "Weevils," he gulped. "Run!"

"Doc, don't ya think you're overreacting a little?" asked the Joker, nonchalantly rubbing his forehead where blood was streaming. He held up the Doctor's abandoned plimsoll. "Oh, and here's your shoe. I mean, what can a little bug do to—"

The Doctor was halfway to a police call station along the M4—the M4!—when he heard the Weevils attack and a noise that could be frenzied laughter, could be screaming. He sighed deeply. Why, why, why, why couldn't he just walk away? Why couldn't he let one of the most annoying, most evil people he'd ever met just _die_? If he liked pain, well, mauled to death by a Weevil was the way to go. The Doctor swore in every language he knew, smacking his forehead with his palm, and ran back.

By the time he'd gotten there, though, a curious scene presented itself. Crane was standing with an outstretched arm, and the Weevils were actually retreating from him. They were shivering and whimpering, bowing down in genuine and abject fear, moving back into the night with luminous, alien eyes.

"What did you DO?" asked the Doctor, fearing to hear the answer.

"Fear toxin," panted Crane. "Funny how the very thing I got put in Arkham for is what saves my life." He removed the burlap mask and wiped his sweaty forehead on it. "Doctor, what _were _those things?"

The Doctor didn't answer. He was looking at the Joker lying down in the grass. One hand was holding a knife, stained black with Weevil blood, and it was difficult to distinguish what was makeup and what was a bloody smile. "I _hate _to ask," said the Doctor, groaning, "but is he okay?"

The Joker coughed. "Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore."


	9. Chapter 9

"Here's a simulation of recent Rift activity," said Jack, bringing up a graphic model of the city of Cardiff. He hit the button that released it on time-lapse, showing the course of the last 24 hours. At approximately 3 a.m., a red spike focused cleanly on what Bruce recognized as Mermaid Quay.

"Gwen, can you get the actual numerical read-outs?—maybe you can chart the progress of where this spike in the Rift would have started."

"Time or space coordinates?" asked Gwen, typing furiously.

"Both, preferably," said Jack.

"Here, may I?" asked Bruce. Gwen pushed her rolling chair over to Bruce, who sat down and moved with consummate skill through the computer software.

"So you know Oracle software, do you?" asked Gwen.

"I have something similar," smirked Bruce.

"It's pointing to something in the eastern seaboard of the North America," said Gwen. "Bruce, can we get a print out, please?"

"Of course."

As the laser printer hummed, Jack rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "According to this, two time streams have collided, both targeting a large metropolitan area at two separate times. Approximately 3 a.m. on the lower east side, and about 5 a.m. further north."

"The road out of Arkham Asylum," said Bruce grimly.

"But what metropolitan area?" asked Gwen. "According to my geography, there _isn't _one in that area on the map."

"You did GCSEs in geography?" asked Jack.

"I did, yes," said Gwen, folding her arms over her chest. Jack reached for his cup of coffee and found it empty. "Ianto!" he yelled.

"Ianto's not here," said Gwen.

"Forgot," said Jack.

"And doesn't that worry you the least bit, Jack? I mean, you don't seem all that concerned—"

"Gwen, I'm going to take Mr. Wayne here on a tour of the Hub. I neglected to give him one when he first arrived, and I think we should show him some of that famous Welsh hospitality."

Gwen looked nonplussed. "Yeah, okay."

Bruce got out of his chair, handing the print outs to Gwen. "Analyze these, would you?" Jack asked her, giving her a wink. "We're starting with the holding cells."

"You were saying that Gotham had its share of savage characters," said Jack, leading Bruce through the dank holding cells in the lower levels of Torchwood, past rows of Perspex prisons.

Bruce looked into one of the cells and brooded. "That's not human."

"Ten points for Mr. Wayne!" Jack grinned as Bruce stared at the half reptilian, half insectoid shape of a spitting, growling Weevil. "We call them Weevils," continued Jack. "They started appearing out of the sewers. Nobody knows how or why. We can't communicate with them—at least, no one's been able to yet." The Weevil focused on Bruce and bared its razor-sharp teeth, then launched itself at the Perspex. "We keep them here—gets them off the street, away from where they could hurt people."

"How many are out there?" asked Bruce. "I heard you say to Gwen that numbers were up."

"We're not sure how they breed," said Jack. "That was a pet project of Owen's, actually." Jack's voice died. "Anyway, I'm just . . . showing you what we're up against."

Bruce looked down and turned away from Jack. "If the Rift has really sent two sets of reality against each other at right angles, which you and your version of Oracle are alleging, is there any way that I can get back to Gotham?" Jack began to speak, but Bruce added, "I want to help you, Jack, and I can only do that up to a certain point as Bruce Wayne." He turned and stood at his full height. "I left most of my costume and gear back in the Cave."

"Not a problem," said Jack. "Let me show you to the armoury."

* * *

Gwen had done all the figures and written up a summary neatly in red pen—her police work had taught her how to do things backing procedure, if without a certain flair. She'd had time to make another pot of coffee and shoot paper airplanes across the Hub. Then she'd sat down at the computer screen and typed the name "Bruce Wayne" into the UNIT-sponsored database. Batman. Batman. Batman. These were all the hits the program could come up with? She could have Googled for better results than that. _What _was going on?

"Find anything?" asked Jack as he and Bruce bounded up the stairs.

"Nothing we didn't already know," sighed Gwen. She handed the results and summary to Jack and Bruce; she watched them carefully. Bruce was tall, handsome, chiselled, muscular—as absurd as it was to think it, she could just imagine a half-mask of black acetate and lycra shading his dark eyes. She rubbed her wedding ring around her finger. What was she thinking?! Batman was nothing more than a comic book hero who flew around a _fictional _city in tights. This was the real world. Wasn't it?

"Okay, Gwen, good work. But I think it's clear what our next step's gotta be. We've call in an expert," said Jack.

"Torchwood aren't experts?" asked Bruce critically.

"Mickey Smith," said Jack. "Likes to call me Captain of the Innuendo Squad."

"I just can't see why," said Bruce.

"Hey!" snapped Jack, as he used his computer monitor to dial up Mickey. He had just gotten the voice inbox for an Orange Answerphone—typical Mickey!—when Gwen's own mobile rang.

"Hello, darling," she said. "Yes, yes, I'm up. Are you okay?"

Bruce turned to Jack. Jack mouthed the word "husband" and looked pointedly at the ring on Gwen's finger.

"What are you talking about, Rhys? Hang on." She turned to look at Jack and Bruce and connected her phone with a port into her computer. Then she hit "speakerphone."

"Gwen, are you there?" came the distinctly Welsh voice of Rhys.

"Yes, my lovely, what were you saying?"

"I said, have you seen the news yet? It was the first thing I heard. My mobile going off like a firecracker."

"I thought you said this had something to do with Torchwood."

"Her _husband_ knows about the top-secret government organization?" asked Bruce. Jack shrugged and gave him a pained look.

"Switch on the TV, Gwen, I assume that office of yours has got one." On cue, Jack picked up the remote and down glided a plasma screen with BBC Breakfast being interrupted by breaking regional news. "They told me not to even bother going out in the lorry today," said Rhys' disembodied voice. "They say a semi just _materialized _on the M4 in the early hours of the morning."

". . . witnesses from a National Express coach en route to London Gatwick airport insist they were seconds from death as the American-made lorry appeared in its lane."

Bruce's eyes narrowed on the fun-fair motif decorating the outside of the semi, seen from aerial footage swarmed by rubber-necking traffic and camera crews.

"I thought here's something for them down at Torchwood: disappearing and reappearing lorries!" cried Rhys with a combination of awe and humor.

"Thank you, Rhys," said Gwen weakly.

The reporter continued, "No driver was found, and witnesses say three unidentified individuals leapt out of the back of the vehicle just before the coach braked." There was some shaky footage, obviously taken from a camera phone, of three men running into the greenery on the hard shoulder of the west-bound M4. "Seen here, the now-missing suspects appear to be wearing fancy dress. This man—" The picture zeroed in on a heavily-pixelated man in brown pinstripe "—is colloquially known as the Doctor . . ."

"Oh no," said Jack and Bruce at the same time.


	10. Chapter 10

**Sorry for the delay, folks.**

The Doctor gnawed the head off a green jelly baby. Normally he would offer them to any other living soul who was around, but he just didn't feel like giving sweets to murderous, psychotic Arkham Asylum escapees. With the Joker still lying down on the grass from the Weevil attack—real or feigned, the Doctor didn't know—and Crane winded, the Doctor felt somewhat sure he could escape. But he was sure that without supervision, these maniacs might bring very real harm to anyone who was unlucky enough to cross their paths. He had helped them to escape, now he needed to see that they were properly locked up again. And not get locked up himself in the process.

"The M4," he sighed, tearing at his hair. "Going west. Crane, what did you see back there—on the highway?"

Crane wiped his glasses and balanced them on the bridge of his nose. "The signs. They were in two languages."

"That's right." The Doctor licked his index finger and held it up to the air. "And the sea, can you smell that?" Crane sniffed experimentally. "I'd say we're just outside of Cardiff." This thought suddenly, irrationally, made him think of Jack and Torchwood and Martha. "We could very well run into some old buddies of mine."

The Joker half raised himself up from the ground. "Ooooh, that sounds fun. You bake the scones, Doc, I'll make the tea."

The Doctor bent down and said as forcefully as he could manage, "You keep well away from my friends!"

The Joker just smiled deviously, but Crane said, "Cardiff—that's in Wales."

"Your deductive reasoning quite astonishes me, Dr. Crane."

"If we were driving from Gotham," said Crane, ignoring him, "how is it possible—the sheer number of laws of physics that we're breaking—"

"But Cardiff—Cardiff means the Rift," said the Doctor, talking to himself. "Gotham—Cardiff. One plane of existence superseding onto another like—whoosh!—tectonic plates shifting the fabric of the universe."

"And they say _I'm _crazy," said the Joker, from the ground.

"Can you just shut up for one—"

"Doc, you don't look so good."

The Doctor stabbed a finger at the Joker's purple coat. "Kettle? _Pot. _Now _shut_—up."

The Joker muttered something and rolled over on the grass as the Doctor turned away. He and Crane walked a safe distance from the bushes and further away from the highway. It wasn't difficult to figure out which way was Cardiff from the track the Doctor had forged, avoiding other people and Weevils. The sun was rising murkily to the east, illuminating the skyline of Wales' capital city. "This Rift," asked Crane, "can it work both ways? Is it like a worm hole?"

The Doctor dug around in his coat pockets, looking for the sonic screwdriver, but only found the knife the Joker had given him. He threw it angrily into the bushes. "Impossible to harness that energy. For most people, anyway." He grabbed Crane by the collar. "What makes you think I'm going to help you and Chuckles get back to where you came from? They should lock both of you away and bury the key in the mines of Peladon."

"Why do you assume we're cut from the same cloth?" asked Crane, gently disengaging the Doctor's fingers from around his throat. "I'm no one's stooge—just waiting for the opportune moment. You can take him to a hospital if you want, you can leave him in the bushes—it's all the same to me."

"You're very blithe about choosing sides," said the Doctor, wiping his hand on his coat. He lowered his voice. "Who is he?"

Crane sighed like he had answered this question many times before. "Nobody knows for sure."

"That story, about the . . ." The Doctor indicated his face. "Was that for real?"

"Who's to say?" replied Crane, replacing the Scarecrow mask over his face. "You talk about picking sides—he doesn't choose sides. The Joker's in a whole other league. The longer we stick around, the sooner we're going to die."

The Doctor remembered the very real fear on Crane's face when the latter had suggested not to break the Joker out of Arkham—before the Doctor even knew the Joker's name. Before he'd even seen the face and wondered if all the perversities sprang from that—or it was a rotten soul that was decomposing from the inside. "What does he _want? _The people I run into, it's money or power, world domination—unlimited rice pudding . . ."

There was a click behind the Doctor's head, and he was hardly surprised to feel a gun at the nape of his neck—he'd been threatened by enough in the past to not know that singular feeling of cold metal. "It's boredom, Doc," said the Joker from behind him. "An aversion to rules. Somehow I can tell that you don't like rules much yourself."

The Doctor tried not to shiver. He could not lose the battle for sanity. He gritted his teeth. "Well?"

The Joker swung round and put the gun away with a nonchalance that seemed to indicate to the Doctor he had no real intention of firing. Besides, one didn't shoot one's toy—one messed about, tortured, one's plaything. The Doctor noticed the Joker seemed to be limping, and dried blood was mottling the clown makeup. "You seem to know this Cardiff place pretty well," he said. "Why don't you show the good doctor and me around?" He dug out a switchblade and began stroking it along his scars. "Maybe we'll even run into your _friends._"


	11. Chapter 11

**N.B. I think the violence goes up a notch here. And by the way, chapter 12 is arguably my favorite, so you're in for a treat.**

Martha Jones had come up in the world. True, there was nothing quite like being the Doctor's constant companion, travelling through space and time in a wonky old police box. But she'd spent most of the time mooning over the Doctor, and she'd done quite a lot on her own. The year that never was continued to haunt her dreams, but since then, she'd been in all the right places at the right time. Working with UNIT. New York, then Germany. Dr. Jones, with a cool head, ingenuity, experience, and a heart. A heart that belonged to Dr. Tom Milligan. Martha couldn't resist flashing the engagement ring on her finger one more time. Six weeks. Six weeks 'til the wedding.

So what was she doing in Cardiff, then? It wasn't exactly far-flung or exotic, and normally if any dangers cropped up, Jack and the Torchwood team could handle them. But for the moment, Martha was still UNIT—not Torchwood. She _liaised, _she believed was the proper term. What Torchwood didn't know wouldn't hurt them. Her mission was top-secret—as most of them were these days; a short phone call to her mum, to let her know she was all right, and then into the field again. No one could know that in an abandoned house somewhere between Caerphilly, Cardiff, and Margam, someone had managed to salvage a Dalek from those not destroyed in the cataclysmic events at the beginning of the summer. Someone had painstakingly reconstructed it and was planning to use it as their own personal killing machine. Martha Jones was going in to stop them and wipe the scene. So no one would even have a whisper of what might have gone on.

Normally missions of this sort, however grim, were accompanied with chit-chat. But Martha's driver in the unobtrusive van was quiet, wouldn't even look at her. Rain, again, she thought, fogging up her backseat window.

*

It was pouring as the Doctor uneasily led the Scarecrow and the Joker toward the outskirts of Cardiff and Bute Park in the distance. All three of them were quickly soaked, mud splotching all over their shoes as they lurched on. The Doctor noticed the Joker's limp had become more pronounced, but every time he thought they might slow down, so the Doctor could enact some cunning plan he'd not yet thought up, the Joker would burst into another Aqua song. Crane had been laughing at this incongruity at first, but on the third chorus of "My Oh My" had demanded they find somewhere dry to wait out the storm.

"Dunno," shouted the Doctor over the din of the rain, parting his limp forelock over his eyes. "This is Wales—could go on forever like this." It was hard to believe the sun had even risen; the valleys were struck in an eerie kind of twilight that, even the Doctor admitted, was hardly in keeping with the season.

". . . rule the country, baby, you and I!" the Joker shouted at the top of his lungs.

"You fool," said Crane with thorough disdain. "Why, why, why am I saddled with fools?"

The Doctor cleared his throat and jabbed a thumb toward what looked like a derelict farmhouse. "Looks abandoned. And dry."

The Joker shoved past Crane to where the Doctor was pointing. "And likely not to contain any _peo_ple. Nice choice, Doc, totally predictable. _You _don't want anyone to get hurt . . ."

"Just forgot my brolly, that's all," said the Doctor playfully, thumbs hooked over his trouser pockets. Doing his best to look nonchalant in a thunderstorm. "This all right with you, Crane?"

"Maybe we can find hot cocoa and roast some marshmallows," said the Joker, pushing past the Doctor and limping toward the house. "Stay up late and have a _slumber _party."

"Horlicks," said the Doctor with flippancy pleasant enough to rival the Joker's.

"Gin," said Crane simply.

When they reached the house, the Doctor tried the front door. Then the Joker kicked it down with a triumphant shout of, "Honey, we're home!" The three stood wetly at the threshold as nothing answered from the interior of the house.

"Smells like . . ." began Crane.

"Salt and vinegar," said the Doctor slowly. "And overcooked meat."

"Good," said the Joker, cocking his gun. "Somebody's made us dinner."

He went in with the gun pointed at shadows and started randomly shooting. Sparks flew and debris was hammered with bullets. "What the hell are you doing?!" the Doctor cried.

"Couldn't see anything," said the Joker sullenly.

"It's called a light switch!" exasperated the Doctor, reaching a dripping hand up the wall and coming on contact with a switch. He flipped it, and the lights briefly went on before shorting out. "Fine," said the Doctor to the darkness. "The sonic screwdriver's got a torch on it. Why don't you try that?"

"Don't bother," said Crane, shining a path from a pen light he'd had in his pocket. The Doctor silently cursed, hoping at last he'd be able to get the sonic back from the Joker. They moved cautiously through the living room of the house. Though the floorboards creaked and were covered with dust, there was still the overwhelming stench of something alive—or that had recently been alive. "Someone's been living here," said Crane impassively. They kicked over empty tins of spaghetti hoops and used cans of lager.

"Squatters," tsked the Joker, still holding the gun at arm's length. "Where's the kitchen?"

As both fugitives turned, the Doctor crept backward toward a staircase leading to what he assumed was the basement. If he could somehow trap them in the house, just for a few minutes, he might be able to—The floor creaked under him, a dead giveaway. He took another step backward, kicking over a stack of books which clomped to the floor. "Stay where you are," snapped Crane. The Doctor obliged but bent to pick up the stack of books. "_Bomb-Making_," he read. "_Columbine: What Can We Learn. Al's Guide to Sawed-Off Shot Guns." _

"Let me see that," the Joker said with pointed interest.

"I'm feeling a bit uneasy about this," said the Doctor.

"Pffft, amateur stuff," assessed the Joker and flung the books back down the staircase.

"**Identify, identify**!" came a strange and bloodcurdling voice from downstairs.

"I know that voice," said the Doctor, with terror in his eyes. It was instinct now that was driving him. If he'd stopped to think, to really think, he would have just walked calmly out the door and let the two murderers deal with their fate. But since he had first laid eyes on that cool metallic casing, heard the voice from the creature within, half mechanism, half primal scream, his reaction had been to get all life away. "Get out of this house as quickly as you can," he whispered.

But it was too late. The Dalek was already coming up the staircase. The Doctor could see its eyestalk as it said, "**Elevate**!"

"Move, move, move!" shouted the Doctor, pushing past the other two men and rushing up the stairs to the house's first floor. Crane and the Joker quickly followed him, and once they were all upstairs, the Dalek moving slowly in pursuit, the Doctor threw a rickety Queen Anne table and chairs, one by one, down the staircase. They didn't strike the Dalek, but they slowed its ascent. The Doctor dove behind a sofa in the upper room, smelling damp and dead things. Crane followed him, but the Joker stood standing on the landing, watching the Dalek with undisguised interest.

"What is _that?_" asked Crane.

"It's a Dalek," the Doctor said, voice breaking with the strain. "It's a creature from outside this world, made up of nothing but egotism and hate. We've got to find a way out of here before it—"

The Doctor never finished his sentence, as the Joker had begun firing the handgun at the Dalek. "You idiot!" the Doctor shouted. "You'll just provoke it!"

The Dalek fired a shot from its gun-appendage that singed the shoulder of the Joker's coat. But that didn't stop him firing. He threw down one gun and found another from somewhere in his coat. Bullets were pinging off the Dalek's metal casing as it roared, "**Exterminate**!" with every killer beam it sent toward the Joker.

"Aim for the eyestalk!" the Doctor found himself saying, not knowing what would be worse: to be left at the Joker's mercy—or the Dalek's. Crane was frantically feeling around behind the sofa for some kind of weapon. The Doctor saw his hand close around a crowbar.

With one well-aimed shot, the Joker shot out the Dalek's eyestalk. "**My vision is impaired, I cannot see**!"

"Now that's more like it!" the Joker bellowed, as the confused Dalek began to whip its head and damaged eyestalk around and around. Its stunted appendages shot wildly for a few moments before it lowered itself on the top step of the staircase. The Joker grabbed the crowbar out of Crane's hand and made a savage leap onto the Dalek. Both fell down the stairs into the pile of rubble the Doctor had created when he threw the furniture at the Dalek.

The Doctor and Crane got out from behind the sofa and watched in horrified fascination as the Joker smashed the Dalek's eyestalk off in one clean blow. He was grunting ferally as he rained brutish cracks at the Dalek's gun-appendage. The Dalek made a liquid-y, surrendering noise as its gun-appendage was hacked off. "Come _on_!" shouted the Joker, running at the Dalek and knocking it onto its side. "Fight! Is that the best you can do?"

The Dalek gurgled in distress as the Joker hit and kicked it with demoniacal fury. The Doctor was appalled and yet—there were cleaner ways to kill a Dalek, and kill them one must almost always do. In his darkest days, even the Doctor had picked up a gun to put an end to a Dalek that had been redeemed by Rose. He'd let thousands of Daleks be sucked into the Void without compunction; out of sight, out of mind. Seeing the killing machine completely defeated would have been almost triumphal—if it wasn't, he was convinced, being destroyed by another killing machine. Still, a tiny, tiny part of the Doctor was grateful.

Now the Dalek was screaming. The Joker had released a blade out of the toe of his boot and was slicing through the Dalek's metal casing as he continued to hammer it with blows. He was jumping up and down on his free foot and practically foaming at the mouth. He gave one final, tremendous clout to its head, and the top of its casing burst off in a crackling array of mutant Dalek and electricity. The Joker stood, panting, over the Dalek carcass before throwing the crowbar against the wall. He grunted and leaned against the staircase, most of his makeup wiped clean by the rain and sweat. He looked up at the Doctor, and it was hard to say what exactly his eyes held. The Doctor gulped, unsure what to say in return.

The Doctor heard Crane get up behind him, but he had barely tasted the acrid smoke from the jet concealed in Crane's suit before he fell, dazed to the floor. _Fear toxin, _he thought. _Crane, you bastard. _The Doctor held his breath, counted to ten, counted sheep. He thought about K'anpo and meditation and deep breathing and Zygons. Huuuge Zygons that stared their wicked orange stare through beady eyes that gleamed hate. Zygons with stings and a foul smell and pustules of orange. _Stop. _Shadows that moved, shadows that were taking people's last words, heywhoturnedoutthelightsheywhoturnedoutthelights . . . _Stop. _He saw a spidery skeleton over Gallifrey made of bone, and then a Gallifrey that was no more. And guilt and blame in the eyes of his people. "Romana? Romana, I'm so sorry . . ." And Leela. Leela's speckled, spangled eyes. Adric. He saw a gold star and an impassive Cyberman. He heard the crunch of gold meeting the metal shell of a murderer. _Stop. _

"How much did you give him?"

There was light streaming from his eyes, and everything burned. He wanted to become the burning. _Stop. Must be stronger than . . . _He thought about an underwater base strewn with the bodies of Silurians and humans. "There should have been another way . . ." And he was back on Skaro holding two wires together, almost crossing, and there was fear. Fear that he'd done the wrong thing. _Yes! You have the right! Just do it! _And the bottomless fear as his nemesis, the last of his people, died in his arms. He would have exchanged places then and there. Given up that mantle to one he knew would use it for evil. _I fear to be alone. _

"It's humanly impossible for him to resist that dosage."

Lynda with a Y. All that trust in her face. The sadness of Billy Shipton. Katarina at the airlock. Sara Kingdom's scream. _Stop it!! _Like Cyrano de Bergerac, he was feinting at phantoms. And the fear of being too cold, too cruel, in order to do this job, as Martha Jones looked at him, disappointed, one last time. _I'm sorry . . . _The bitterness of Sutekh. The deadly beauty of Morgaine's eyes. He felt the heat of a molten planet tearing itself apart, and in that, the animal passions telling him to _kill . . . _In his hand was a rock, and he was raising it to crush a skull. _Doctor, you coward—Doctor, you hypocrite. _The Master laughed—"Die, Doctor, die!"—the Valeyard laughed, and the Joker laughed.

The Doctor reached up and grabbed Crane by the throat, pushing him against the wall. "You didn't know—" he wrenched out "—that I'm—not—HUMAN—" With a casual rage, the Doctor dashed Crane's head against the wall until the twisted psychologist lost consciousness. The Doctor let him slump on the floor and caught sight of the bubbling mess of Dalek entrails on the floor. He turned slowly to the sound of mocking applause behind him.

The Joker was at the base of the stairs, having taken off his coat and having lain it over the cracked Dalek casing. "Doc, I'm really impressed."

"Don't."

"Wouldn't dream of it," said the Joker. "Just wanted to try Crane's fear toxin on another subject." He pulled up a struggling woman from beneath the wreckage of the table and chairs. The Doctor's eyes widened as he recognized her. The Doctor could feel both of his hearts stopping as the Joker brought his blade up against her cheek. Martha!

"Little princess in a terrible mess . . ." cackled the Joker.


	12. Chapter 12

Gwen was sitting boredly at her PC. With the TV permanently switched on to the unfolding search for the Doctor and the two unidentified misanthropes in fancy dress, Jack and the mysterious Bruce Wayne had disappeared. _Like Ianto_, thought Gwen, from whom hide nor hair had been heard since the whole thing had started. Gwen had to choke down an obscene picture of what Jack and the generously-endowed Bruce might be doing somewhere in the Hub, but she was quickly distracted by CCTV footage from out in Cardiff Bay. "What's _that, _then?" she asked. With a few quick clicks of her mouse, she enlarged the picture in real-time.

Gwen rubbed her eyes a couple of times. Was she going absolutely bonkers? Had the entire city decided to host a fancy dress competition except no one had told Gwen Cooper? Slinking in the shadows between the red brick façade of the Pierhead Building and the bright glass of the National Assembly Building was a statuesque female form in black leather. A cat woman.

Gwen thought she had seen it all. She heard the sound of Jack's boots clomping from the other room, and was prepared to tell him about her latest discovery. She turned, and the words withered on her lips. Standing next to Jack was . . .

"Batman?!" A hulk of rippling muscles in black Kevlar and lycra, with a swirling, rapturous black cape. A tool belt gleaming in the overhead lights of the Hub, gloved hands curled in powerful fists, and eyes gleaming brightly from underneath a spiky-eared cowl.

"Jack, tell me now, am I going crazy or what?" Gwen got out of her chair and backed away, holding her arms out to ward off the grim black shape.

"Gwen, it's okay," said Jack, laughing. "You're not going crazy, I swear."

"Then what's a man dressed up in spandex doing in the Hub? Presumably that's Bruce Wayne in there, and why wouldn't it be, since everyone knows Bruce Wayne is Batman?" Gwen knew she was babbling, but it had been a long, long night.

"One parallel universe," said Jack, holding up his coffee mug, "another parallel universe." He picked up Gwen's coffee mug and brought them alongside each other. "They've smashed together, Gotham and Cardiff."

"One problem," said Gwen. "Gotham's a fiction. We're in the _real _world."

"In Gotham," said Jack, setting down the mugs, _"we're _the fiction. Bruce had never heard of Torchwood. But when he looked us up, there we were."

"I don't understand," said Gwen, running her hands through her hair.

"Infinite parallelism," grunted Batman in a rough voice that made Gwen almost want to laugh. "And enough cracks through the worlds to let little hints of their counterparts in, even if it's just unconscious, through an artist's conduit."

Gwen took a deep breath. If these two were going to lecture at her all day, she may as well dispense with the explanations and get to the juicy bits. "Fine. Whatever you say. I've seen some strange things . . . But why's Batman out on the prowl, so to speak? How are we going to get him back to his universe?"

"Hopefully Mickey will be able to answer that," said Jack, picking up several of his guns from his desk and loading their clips.

"And where are you going now? With all that ammo?"

"I didn't come alone through the Rift," said Batman in his gruff voice. "Two of Gotham's most dangerous criminals came, too."

Jack threw his mobile at Gwen, who caught it on reflex. "Got a top-secret call from UNIT. Martha Jones' driver hasn't seen her for the last half hour."

"Martha's in Cardiff?" asked Gwen.

"On a mission outside Margam. She's disappeared into a house in prime Weevil territory, and we're pretty sure Batman's Arkham Asylum pals are involved."

Gwen pinched herself. What was she tripping out on? "What makes you say that?"

"Rift particles in the vicinity," said Jack, grinning. Gwen wanted to smack him. He was really enjoying confounding her like this. Then he threw her the SUV keys.

"And who do you suppose is going to babysit Torchwood while we're gone? In case you haven't noticed, Ianto still—"

"I've told Mickey," Jack said through a mouthful of breakfast bap, which he offered first to Batman and then to Gwen, who both declined, "to come straight to the Hub and watch it for us while we're gone."

"Great," said Gwen, fingering the keys and looking at the two maniacs opposite her.

*

Mickey Smith got out where the taxi had left him on West Bute Street and paid the driver, gazing around him. It had been raining all morning, and at last some of the late summer sun was beginning to shine on the Bay. He'd taken the train down to Cardiff for the first time more than three years before. And his life had changed—really changed—since then.

Being in a parallel universe was like living in a foreign country. Everything was the same but different, maddeningly different. With his Gran, with Rose and her family, Mickey had almost succeeded in believing himself home. But Rose had changed forever, and the love she may have felt for him the last time they were in Cardiff—even if Big Ears had been completely getting in the way—was irrevocably gone. But Mickey wasn't one to dwell on misfortune. That's why he'd come back to the world where he was born.

Putting on his shades, he moved quickly toward Roald Dahl Plas, where he would find Captain Jack and Torchwood. He'd been there at the Battle of Canary Wharf, he'd seen the destruction of that Torchwood headquarters. With this one securely situated in the heart of Cardiff, Mickey really hoped no Cybermen or Daleks would be coming to destroy it. Mickey was walking down at the water's edge, entering the curve that led into the Oval Basin, when a hand reached around his mouth and yanked him, gagged and kicking, into a little hollow.

Mickey's eyes widened in amazement. Holding one clawed hand over his mouth and the other, claws out, against his throat, was a woman dressed up like Catwoman. The black leather jumpsuit hugged her every curve, and her eyes were hidden by huge goggles shaped like cat-eyed glasses. Mickey tried to reach into his jeans pocket to pull out his mobile, but Catwoman slashed at his hand with her claw. Mickey cringed and tried to bite her fingers, but the flexible leather covering her palm prevented him.

"Where am I?" Catwoman hissed.


	13. Chapter 13

**Sorry--Chapter 13 is my favorite.**

The Doctor's first impulse was rage. But he could not let on that he knew who Martha was. His hope that she would understand the significant look in his eyes died when she cried in surprise, "Doctor!"

"Oh-ho-ho-ho!" laughed the Joker, holding the struggling Martha tightly under both arms, the silvery switchblade just inches from her right eye. "So you _do _know each other!" Martha's legs were scrabbling, trying to find a foothold, trying to trip up the Joker, and her eyes were doing the same, wildly looking from Crane slumped at the top of the staircase to the very dead Dalek to the Doctor. The Joker took her waist in his free hand and pulled her upright. "Who is she?"

"Dr. Martha Jones," said the Doctor tensely. "You can let her go, she—"

"I want _her _to tell me," the Joker grunted, dully pressing the point of the knife against Martha's jaw.

She gasped. "Who are you? What the hell is this? Doctor, help—"

"I asked first," the Joker purred, taking Martha's face between thumb and forefinger and pricking her skin with the knife, holding her by the hip.

"Martha Jones," Martha whispered, pale, stammering, clammy. "D-Dr. Martha Jones."

"Gee, this place is just crawling with doctors!" the Joker shrieked. He shoved Martha up against the wall opposite the banister. "Glad you could join the party, _Dr._ Jones."

Martha stared at the knife, then tried to jerk her head toward the Doctor, who was moving with slow determination down the staircase. "Hey, look at me," the Joker said, pulling her face toward him.

"I came here to neutralize a Dalek," she said loudly.

"Yeah, well, that's been done-uh," the Joker said. "One step closer, Doc, and Miss Jones gets firsthand experience of fresh scar tissue."

"Just—don't touch her," said the Doctor.

Martha seemed to regain a bit of her determination. She looked the Joker in the eyes. "Look, I've been terrorized by more frightening psychopaths than you. I'm not going to fall apart just because some clown decides to play with knives."

The Joker caressed her face with the knife. "I like that, Maaaaaartha. But then why's your heart beating so fast?" He gave a leer at the Doctor. "Can you hear it from over there, Doc?"

Martha gulped and gave her attacker a cold stare. "Adrenaline," she said. "Don't overestimate your own abilities."

The Joker giggled. "Nev-ah, Dr. Jones!" he cried with mock-severity. "You can call me the Joker, by the way. And let's see, if you came here to destroy the Dee-alek, you must have some kind of firearm on you? Yes?" He smiled at her, showing his yellowed teeth.

"Martha," said the Doctor, "give it to him."

"But Doctor—" cried Martha, her fingers inches away from the trigger of her UNIT-issued gun concealed on a strap underneath her protective vest.

"If you don't give it to him," said the Doctor gravely, "he'll take it."

Grimacing, Martha reached inside her vest and pulled out the gun, handing it into the Joker's purple glove. He kept her throat covered with the knife and emptied out the shells of the gun with his other hand. He threw the disabled gun across the floor, where it landed next to the glutinous remains of the Dalek, and he smacked his lips. Upstairs, Crane stirred. The Doctor raced up and kneeled next to him.

"So, toots, how far back do you and the Doctor go?" the Joker asked Martha, a hand on either of her shoulders, pressing her against the wall.

"That's none of your business," said Martha tersely.

He looked impassively into her eyes. "You totally dig him, dontcha?"

"Look, freak-face," said Martha, lifting up her right hand, and shoving her ring finger toward him, "I'm engaged. Is that clear enough or do I have to put it in terms you'll understand?"

"You tried to kill me!" Crane shouted from the top of the stairs, launching himself onto the Doctor.

The Joker chuckled. "I don't believe I introduced you to my associate, Dr. Crane."

"Doctor!" a horrified Martha shouted.

"No, I just _knocked you out, _you idiot!" the Doctor said in response, trying to keep Crane's skinny fingers from choking him. "_You _tried to kill me!"

"Aren't you going to do something?" Martha stormed at the Joker.

"Like what? Film it for Pay Per View?"

"You're disgusting," said Martha.

"You keep telling yourself that," leered the Joker, leaning in close and brushing the side of her neck first with his lips, then with the blade of the knife.

"Oh my God!" Martha raged as the Doctor and Crane rolled around on the floor, dodging each other's fists.

"Martha, just—" came the Doctor's anguished voice.

"You're bleeding," said Martha suddenly, her voice softer and unabrasive.

The Joker was clearly taken aback. "I don't need a medical pro-_fess-_i-nullll to tell me that."

"Looks like bites," said Martha, nodding toward the Joker's upper left arm, where his shirt was sodden with blood. She looked at his right shoulder, where the cloth had been burnt away. "The Dalek do that to you?" He grunted in response. "I'm a trained doctor," said Martha stonily. "Let me take a look."

The Joker eased up slightly, letting Martha's fingers examine the bloody mess of his left arm. "Ow," he said as she pinched the wound.

"Could be infected," she said. "Does it hurt?"

"Yee-ahhh, duhhh," said the Joker. Martha took some Kleenex out of her coat pocket and began swabbing at the blood. The Joker began laughing maniacally. "Tickles . . ."

There was a clomping sound on the stairs as the wrestling Doctor and Crane fell down the steps and into the pile of ruined furniture. Martha jerked back toward them to see what was happening but then pretended to be entirely engaged in the Joker's wound. "Apply pressure here," she said clinically. "It'll stop the bleeding." He was staring at her, clearly unsure of any conduct that was directed in a kind manner. Martha sighed loudly and reached around his upper arm, tying the Kleenex around the wound.

"Gee, thanks, Dr. Jones," said the Joker thickly. "Where's your needle and thread? You gonna sew it up for me, too?"

"Would you like me to?" asked Martha softly. Before he could reply, she glanced quickly over her shoulder. She shoved forward, first kneeing him in the groin and then punching him in the stomach, and diving out of the way as the Doctor came careening down the staircase and body-slammed him. Both the Doctor and Martha twisted out of the way as Crane came next, picking up the crowbar and whapping the Joker on the side of the head. The Clown Prince of Crime slumped against the wall.

Crane raised the crowbar to strike again, but the Doctor caught his arm. "That's enough," said the Doctor. Crane fixed him with a look of pure hatred, but dropped the crowbar and leaned against the banister, wiping his glasses. The Doctor hugged Martha. "I'm so sorry I couldn't help you before."

"You wimp!" cried Martha, punching him in the shoulder. "Letting that maniac paw all over me . . .!" She shivered convulsively. "I think I'm going to be sick." She grabbed the Doctor. "And how did you end up in the house of a suspected terrorist with Captain Insan-o and . . ." she shrugged, looking at Crane.

"It's a long story," said the Doctor tiredly. "Can I explain to you on the way?"

"On the way where?"

"To get chips," said the Doctor. "I'm starving."

"Wait a second!" said Martha. "Did he really kill the Dalek?"

"With that very crowbar," said Crane. "I really think we should kill him."

The Doctor gave him a stern look, then turned the Martha. Martha looked down, guiltily. "No, we're not killing him," said the Doctor, to both of them, "and that's final. Martha, how did you get here?"

"UNIT driver left me off—"

"Crane, go find Martha's driver. We're heading into town. I've got to see a man about a Rift."

Martha smirked as Crane left. "Captain Jack?" She reached up to rub some grime and blood off the Doctor's forehead. "Are you okay?"

The Doctor was gazing at the Joker's prone form. "Is he seriously hurt?"

Martha rolled her eyes. "Other than the big ugly scars on his face?"

"Martha!"

"Doctor, I can't believe you! He held me at knife-point—"

"I know," said the Doctor intensely. "I watched him kill three people. He's tried to kill me, and Crane, several times." He cleared his throat. "He was attacked by a Weevil. He was limping."

Martha rolled her eyes and shook her head. "I—cannot—believe—if I get stabbed by some kind of booby trap, it's going to be _all your fault—" _She sat on her heels next to the recumbent Joker. "Which leg?"

"Left leg, I think." Martha, skin clearly crawling, rolled up the Joker's pant leg and laughed incredulously at his purple-and-green argyle sock. Then she felt his ankle. "Possible fracture. He shouldn't really even be able to walk, much less kick the crap out of a Dalek."

"Help me tie him up," said the Doctor. He reached into the Joker's vest pocket.

"What _are _you doing?" asked Martha.

The Doctor retrieved the sonic screwdriver. "I think we should go through all his pockets, too."

"For what?"

"Knives," said the Doctor.

"This just gets better and better," Martha said.


	14. Chapter 14

"You should have seen Gotham before he came along," said Crane bitterly, leading Martha and the Doctor up the sodden path to where Martha's UNIT van was waiting.

"Um, psycho . . .?" Martha whispered to the Doctor, looking at Crane with a grimace.

"Quiet, Martha," said the Doctor tersely. He turned back to Crane. "I can't imagine he made an entire city from the virtually crime-free to absolutely riven with inequity." He pocketed the sonic screwdriver. "In fact, I _know _that's not the case."

"Besides," added Martha, "someone who goes around wearing a burlap sack on his head can hardly be called law-abiding."

Crane made fists but said only, "There are many degrees of psychosis. As you know, Dr. Jones." Martha folded her arms over her chest and listened grudgingly. "My interest—my mission—was always to learn about fear."

"And to _inflict _it," said the Doctor coldly.

"The Joker burst on the scene robbing banks," said Crane. "He killed all of his accomplices. He went on to kidnap and torture Gotham citizens and broadcast his demands on TV."

"You know who this reminds me of," said Martha. "The Master."

The Doctor gulped and said nothing as they approached the van parked under some trees. It was raining again, soaking a shivering Martha and causing tendrils of dried blood to run down the Doctor's face. As Martha got closer, she noticed that no one was sitting in the driver's seat. "Doctor, what's—"

Before the Doctor could reach her, Crane tripped her. Martha went smashing to the ground, her face covered in mud. Crane picked up a fallen tree branch and knocked her out. The Doctor launched himself onto Crane with an outraged cry, but Crane held out his jacket sleeve over the fallen Martha. "Lay a hand on me, Doctor," came the muffled voice from inside the Scarecrow mask, "and Dr. Jones tests the fear toxin. I know it didn't work on you, but as far as I know, _she _is human."

"Damn you!" shouted the Doctor. "I could have killed you in that house—I could have dashed your brains out on the stairs—"

"But you _didn't," _said Crane. "And now, even if you wanted to, you can't, as Dr. Jones' life depends on your cooperation."

"Oh, I want to, all right," the Doctor growled.

"Unless you wish your friend to die of asphyxiation in the mud, I suggest you lift her into the back seat of the van."

"Where are we going?" the Doctor despaired. "What could you possibly—?"

"I'm tired of being second-best," said Crane.

"You're a coward," said the Doctor.

"Maybe. But I want the Joker out of the picture, for my sake, for Gotham's sake. _You _had the chance to kill him back there—you could have done it. But you were too cowardly to do it."

"That wasn't cowardice, it—"

"In the van, now." Growling, the Doctor lifted Martha's unconscious form into the back seat of the van and belted her in with tenderness.

"Let me drive," said the Doctor. "I'll take you wherever you want to go."

"Nice try," said Crane.

* * *

The Joker found himself at the foot of the staircase in the abandoned house in Margam, hands tied behind his back, with the stench of the rotting Dalek to keep him company. "Hello?" he called. "Any doctors in the hiz-ouse?" Having no response, he began to shout "Barbie Girl" at the top of his lungs as a storm raged outside. He got unsteadily to his feet, reaching into his vest pocket. "_What?!" _he roared. "They took away my knives?" He felt around in both of his vest pockets, then his trouser pockets. "Not cool, not cool," he muttered to himself. Then he smirked. "Now, which one decided to clean me out?" He smacked his lips. "Was it little jumpy Doc or pouty, angry Maaaaartha?" He hopped around on his bad foot, laughing hysterically. He kicked the remains of the Dalek and searched his coat pockets for knives.

"Where did they put them all?" he asked with mock-distress. "But they for-gooooot about this one." He unsheathed the knife in the toe of his boot and kicked the boot off, awkwardly cutting himself free. He pulled his untied hands apart with a loud cry. He stomped his boot back on and marched toward the door, then fell against the wall. "Ooooh," he murmured. "Never trust that loser Crane with a crowbar again."

He got slowly to his feet, shaking his sweat-soaked hair. He paused to put his coat back on, then stopped by the foot of the stairs. "Well, hello there."

A growling Weevil moved slowly into the light, glistening in the dullness as its ugly, reptilian head slithered with rain. The Joker mirrored its crouching motion as he reached down for the discarded crowbar. "How thoughtful of them," he said softly.

The Weevil had stopped where it was, sniffing the air intently. "That's right," said the Joker. "You smell that dead metal brain thing." The Joker giggled. "That was meeee. Don't know if you can understand me, but I did that. Yeah." He continued to laugh as the Weevil bared its teeth and stared at him. "So, you know, maybe ya _don' _wanna come in here." He gripped the crowbar. A second Weevil followed the first one in the doorway. Neither advanced but stood staring at the Joker and sniffing the putrid remains of the Dalek.

"Wait a second," said the Joker, then clapped his hands together in glee. "What if . . .?"

*

"What's up with the weather?" asked Gwen, trying for the third time not to laugh at the idea of Jack driving the Torchwood SUV with Batman riding shot-gun.

"What do you mean?" asked Jack. "It's Wales. It rains."

"Thanks for that, Captain Obvious," said Gwen, who exchanged a smile with Batman. She found herself staring at the sharp angles of the black suit, the odd combination of form and function. It was one thing seeing that suit of flow-y blacks and pearlescent contours on TV or in the films, but in real life—what was she saying?! She blinked and pinched herself again.

"She's right," said Batman. "The light all day has contained a weird quality—a dusky, twilight-like aura."

"Ah, Bruce, so poetic," jibed Jack with a charming smile.

"Outside Margam was the house?" Gwen asked.

"Yeah, and not far from where the semi appeared on the highway and where the Doctor and friends ran off the highway and into the woods."

"I sincerely hope they're not his friends," said Batman grimly.

Jack looked down at the GPS readings and left the road for the uneven ground. The SUV ground to a halt in the rain. Far into the mist Jack thought he could see the outline of an old abandoned house. "Wait," said Batman, putting his gauntlet-ed hand on the wheel, staying Jack. Jack let go of the door handle.

"Jack?" asked Gwen.

"Let me," growled Batman in his gruff voice. Both Jack and Gwen obeyed as the Dark Knight left the front left-hand side of the SUV and strode into the swirling rain, grimacing into the dark.

"Oh, it _must _be Christmas!" came the Joker's disembodied voice from the direction of the house seen only in outline. "The Bat has come to call, and with him new friends! Don't be shy," he drawled. "Come out of the ve-hi-cle and say _hello."_

Both Jack and Gwen's doors slammed open at the same time. "What the hell is this?" asked Gwen, trying to keep the fright out of her high-pitched voice. She couldn't see anything in the rain and dark, but the needly voice addressing Batman must come from one of the freaks they'd shown on the news.

"Where's the Doctor?" Jack shouted. "Where's Martha?"

"Absolutely no clue," muttered the Joker.

"Tell us what you've done to them!" shouted Batman, taking two enormous strides forward.

He was stopped by the vicious sound of jaws crunching together, of alien animal limbs shuffling forward. He was met with the sight of a dozen deep-jawed, hate-eyed, clawed things moving forward slowly, baring their teeth. "Get back inside the SUV!" shouted Jack, grabbing Gwen and moving toward the cab, pulling his handgun.

"What are those?" asked Batman, voice trembling in rage.

"Freaks like me," said the Joker, moving slowly down the hill toward Batman. "When they found out what I could do, they didn't want to fight me—they wanted to join me." He grinned. "I'm their hero, Battsy."

"Good for you," growled Batman, lunging forward.

The Weevils hissed and growled, drawing protectively around the Joker. "Now, now, now," he said. "You'll make 'em anxious."

Jack shot his gun once in the air, startling the Weevils, who backed slowly away, their jaws gibing nothingness. They moved toward Batman slowly. Batman eyed them, then rushed the Joker, grabbing him by the collar. "I'm glad to see you've still got friends in low places," said Batman before punching the Joker hard in his wounded shoulder.

The Weevils surged forward, jumping onto Batman. Batman cried out as one sunk its teeth into his arm. Jack fired at the outer edges of the Weevil maelstrom, careful not to hit Batman. The angry Weevils parted into two groups, one attacking Batman, one attacking Jack. Gwen was ambushed by a Weevil. She shot it at point-blank range. It roared and then fell silent.

"Gwen!" shouted Jack. "Get in the SUV. I want you to drive through the Weevils."

"What?!"

"We don't have a lot of ammo. We've got to pick them off in any way we can!"

Gwen rushed back into the SUV, grabbed the keys, and started the engine. "This is like a zombie movie!" she shrieked, furiously pedalling the gas as the Weevils swarmed the front of the SUV. Lightning crashed, and the thunder was deafening.


	15. Chapter 15

In the UNIT van, the Doctor checked the rear-view mirror. Martha was breathing. She was covered in muck and she was slumped in her seat, but she was all right. Crane was careening around the A4620 as the rain splattered against the windshield.

"I can't take you back to Gotham!" the Doctor shouted.

"That's how we got here, that's how we're getting back."

"Don't you understand?" snarled the Doctor. "My TARDIS is still in Arkham. I want to get back as much as you do. But—"

"Shut up and navigate," snapped Crane, shoving the Doctor against the left-side window.

"Dr. Crane," said the Doctor. "I'm going to give you one last chance to pull over and let me drive."

"You're just like the Joker," said Crane tinnily. "Taking the fun out of everything."

"Okay, I warned you," said the Doctor, retrieving the sonic screwdriver from his pocket. Crane's eyes underneath the Scarecrow mask gleamed in surprise as the Doctor shocked his hands with a beam from the sonic screwdriver. The front wheels squealed as Crane let go of the steering wheel. The Doctor seized him by the collar and pinched him in the neck. Limply, Crane fell awkwardly across the passenger seat. The Doctor dove for the wheel and jammed his foot on the brake. Crane smashed his head on the dashboard as several cars behind the Doctor spewed their fury.

"That's why you should always wear your seatbelt," quipped the Doctor, fastening his and changing gears.

Martha stirred weakly in the back seat. She rubbed her head and looked at the bleeding figure of Crane, shrouded in his Scarecrow mask. She reached to drag his limp body with her in the back. "Oh my God, I'm covered in sh . . ."

"Are you okay? Martha? Martha?"

Martha wiped the mud off her face. "Yes. What's going on?"

"_I'm _taking control. And it's about time." A car honked at the Doctor as he flew through a stop sign.

"Do you want me to drive, Doctor?" Martha asked.

The Doctor smiled at her in the rear-view mirror. "That's all right, Martha. I can drive anything!"

* * *

The Doctor had seen the Torchwood headquarters in Cardiff over broadcast, but he'd never actually set foot in the silvery-chrome den of technology. Like UNIT and all other protection organizations that wielded guns, he got a vaguely itchy feeling walking inside, like he was allergic to ammo or something. On the second level with the computers stood Mickey Smith with a plaster along his jaw. " 'Bout time you got here."

"Ohh, Mickey! Am I glad to see you!" The Doctor was smiling for the first time all day, unashamedly, with real joy. He threw his arms around Mickey in a heartfelt hug.

"Man, Doctor, 'ave you been vinegarizing Slitheen while you were out? You don't smell so good."

"Very funny," said the Doctor, nevertheless running his hands through his dirty, sweaty, totally tousled hair. Mickey looked past him to a downcast Martha, who was rubbing the back of her head where a lump the size of a walnut was in severe need of ice.

"And you, Dr. Jones, did you enter a mud-wrestlin' contest and not tell me?"

"Don't start," snapped Martha, coming up the stairs and pointing a finger angrily at Mickey. "I've had one hell of a day."

"It can't even begin to compare to mine," said the Doctor darkly.

"Anyway, I'm glad to be in competent hands now," said Martha, a little less acidly, and wrapped an arm around Mickey.

"Who's the Halloween freak in the mask?" asked Mickey, looking at the prone shape Martha and the Doctor had dragged in from the UNIT van.

"Dr. Jonathan Crane alias the Scarecrow," said the Doctor, undoing his tie. "Lately of Arkham Asylum in Gotham."

Mickey did a double-take and then grinned. "Oh, that is so weird, because—"

"Doctor, there is nothing I'd like more right now," interrupted Martha, "than a hot shower and to call my fiancé and let him know that I'm all right. But first, we need to lock this nutter up so no one else gets hurt."

Mickey jutted out his lower lip thoughtfully. "Police then?"

"If I'm not mistaken, aren't there holding cells on the lower level?" asked the Doctor.

Mickey shrugged. "Think so. I'm just watchin' the place."

"Yeah, where is Jack?" asked the Doctor. "This isn't his style."

"Didn't you know? He and Gwen went after you."

The Doctor smacked his forehead with his hand. "Fine. First things first, Martha, help me dump Crane downstairs while he's still out cold."

"Not a problem," said Martha brightly. "I'd really like to douse him with some of his own medicine, though. This fear toxin you told me about—it's unethical and could be devastating in the wrong hands."

"I agree," said the Doctor. "If he makes a sound, if he so much as moves, I don't think I can hold you back, Dr. Jones."

"Right," said Martha.

"Then, Mickey, you and I have got to trade notes on the Rift. But first we'd better give Captain Harkness a call. He might be in real danger."

"Him?" Mickey laughed incredulously.

Martha rubbed the knife wound on her throat tellingly.

* * *

In the muddy, rain-soaked woods between Cardiff and Margam, Batman was beating off Weevils with one hand while clutching onto the Joker with the other. "How—did you—escape—from Arkham?" Batman raged, dropping the Joker as he grabbed a leaping Weevil and threw it against a nearby tree.

The Joker giggled and watched as two more Weevils rose up to take their fellow's place. "You're gonna love this. Even I couldn't have engineered it better if I'd tried. Though I think the bigger issue at stake is how did we both end up in this fantasy-land? I mean, I know you lost your mind a long time ago, but—"

Batman grunted, falling over onto his back in the mud as a Weevil went for his jugular.

"Jack!" Gwen shouted, before digging the heel of her boot into the accelerator. "Move out of the flippin' way!" She tugged the gear-shifter into reverse and backed the SUV, wheels squealing in the mud, through the oncoming crowd of Weevils. Their bodies made a sickening crunch as they bounced off the back windshield. Jack just managed to dive out of the way as the SUV came barrelling toward him.

"Damn it," he muttered. "Where's Ianto?!"

Batman sent batarangs through the necks of the two Weevils who jumped onto his prone form and then kicked the Joker in the jaw as he leapt to his feet. "What did you do to the Doctor?" Batman snarled, throwing the Joker against the nearest tree.

The Joker squealed in delight. "Ah, since he's the one who set me free . . . uh, nothing." Batman's eyes narrowed as he kicked two Weevils aside.

Jack dug around in the pockets of his now mud-soaked WWII coat. "Somewhere, somewhere there must be . . . Ah ha!" His fingers curled around a lighter.

"If you're looking for intimate conversation," chortled the Joker, as Batman felled another Weevil who'd tried unsuccessfully to take a chunk of flesh out of his shoulder, "I don't think this is the time-uh or the place."

"Gwen," Jack shouted over his ear-piece. "Stop the car."

Obediently Gwen stuck the stick-shift into neutral, even as enraged Weevils swarmed the vehicle. Jack fought his way to the fuel tank, picking off Weevils one by one with his remaining clip. He yanked off the tank cover and slid the slender branch of a tree into the petrol until it was coated. The air smelled thickly of combustion. Jack ignited the branch and brandished it against the shrinking Weevils.

"Oooh, I like him," said the Joker, a smile splitting his face. By now, the constant rain and exertion had wiped off all his makeup, leaving his scars all the more obvious.

"Call them off," Batman gruffly demanded.

"It's not as easy as whistling or squeezing a chew toy," said the Joker. "Besides, your _pal _is probably making 'em even madder."

Gwen had jumped out of the SUV and copied Jack's example; with their makeshift torches they were beating the Weevils back, making a path toward Batman and the Joker. Batman shot his grappling hook into a large, steady tree branch. He grabbed the Joker under one arm and shot them both into the tree, dangling high above the curious, snarling Weevils.

"Woo-hooo-hoooo!" shouted the Joker. "We _do _always seem to be hanging around together . . ."

Batman climbed steadily into a fork between branches and tied the Joker by the wrist, letting him sway one-handed, from the trunk of the tree. "I think you just like being violent," the Joker went on, smacking his lips. "Despite your moral code or whatever you want to call it. I'm reminded of a certain in-terr-ogation with me being beaten to a bloody pulp and the pretty little assistant D.A. giving up the ghost."

Batman grabbed the Joker by the throat. "Then you know I haven't even begun to beat you to a bloody pulp."

"Okaaay-eeee, but the job's been half done _for _you, Bats," coughed the Joker. He nodded toward his singed shoulder and wounded upper arm. "See?" said the Joker, spitting blood. He picked at the Kleenex around his upper arm. "Dr. Jones left this for me, as a souvenir."

Batman let go of the Joker's throat with disdain. "_She _beat you up?"

"Sadly, no. First I got attacked by the great unwashed mass below us, then I got a bit slap-happy with a living vacuum cleaner that kept yelling 'Exterminate.' Then that wuss Crane made short work with a crowbar."

Batman couldn't prevent a small, grim smile from escaping him. "Sounds like you maybe got what you deserved."

"Yeah, so you gonna let me down in one piece," muttered the Joker, teeth chattering, "or you gonna break your own rules and mete out the ultimate punishment?"

Two shots sailed just above the Joker's head. Batman smiled broadly. "That'll be Jack and Gwen. And they don't play by my set of rules."

On the ground, Jack had the Joker covered while Gwen held the torches out for the last remaining Weevils, the rest either hit or given up. Jack's ear-piece buzzed. "Jack, this is Mickey Smith. Are you there? Do you read me?"


	16. Chapter 16

Batman admitted himself much surprised that in the intervening time it had taken to get the Weevil-incrusted SUV back to the Hub with Gwen and Jack that the Joker hadn't managed to escape. It wasn't until they reached the Hub that his sullen incommunicativeness registered with Bruce—he had actually been telling the truth, in a roundabout way, when he had mentioned all his physical injuries attained in the last day. Partway through the tense SUV trip, he'd passed out during another Aqua song.

"Yikes," had been Gwen's comment.

"I know," said Jack. "Who would wear purple and green?"

Somewhat more seriously, Batman had put in, "Much as part of me would prefer not to do anything, I'm sure the Joker's got a lawyer, and if he's not fit to stand trial in Gotham—"

"So you've got to patch up the bastard," said Jack coldly. Batman nodded curtly.

"Well, we seem to have two doctors on staff, according to Mickey, and one in a holding cell, so I think it's safer _not _going to St. Mary's . . ."

* * *

"Oh no, I'm not going anywhere near him!" The happy Hub reunion of Batman, Jack, Gwen, Mickey, Martha, and the Doctor was marred when Batman put forth his unusual request to the UNIT doctor.

"If it makes you feel any better," said Gwen, "I'll go in there with you. I'll have my hand on my gun."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," said the Doctor. "There won't be any gun-wielding—"

"Seriously!" interjected Mickey. "It's Batman. In the flesh. _Batman_!"

"Mickey!" everyone else said, annoyed.

"Make Crane see to him," argued Martha. "He's a doctor, isn't he?"

"I don't think that's a good idea," said Batman. "Crane might try to kill him."

"_I _might try to kill him."

"Martha—"

"Okay, Gwen, you want to stand in there with me? Wait 'til he starts fondling _you_, then you'll see how truly revolting—"

"This is beneath us, ladies and gentlemen," shouted Jack above the arguing. "We are mature adults, some of whom took a Hippocratic oath."

"Yeah, but if Owen was here—" Martha said weakly.

"Owen's _not _here!" Jack shouted. Everyone fell silent. Batman studied the faces around him, all of them guilty, chagrined, upset.

"Sorry," said Martha, her eyes darting to address everyone at once.

"Martha," said the Doctor thoughtfully, "about how long, based on what you saw before and the fact he was unconscious when they took him in, do you estimate the whole, er, medical care thing will take?"

"Well, maybe there's a mild concussion, surface abrasions, infection, maybe fractures, sprains . . ." she enumerated softly. "I think maybe he just needs food and rest." She swallowed the bile in her throat. "It shouldn't take long, Doctor."

"Because I've got an idea . . ."

Martha smiled faintly. "Smith and Jones, together again."

* * *

Martha held her med kit impassively as she and the Doctor descended to the holding cells. Crane startled them both by banging on the Perspex and murmuring gleefully, "Dr. Jones, how lovely to see you again."

"Shut up, Crane," Martha said, without a trace of venom. She moved slowly but confidently into the Joker's cell, the Doctor directly behind her.

"A house call," Crane taunted as Martha bent to examine the Joker, leaned up against the Perspex wall and in an apparent state of catatonia like they had left him in the Dalek house in Margam. She supposed, for once allowing her natural empathy free rein on the amoral person she was treating, that if she'd been him, just hit with a crowbar and left behind, she wouldn't have been too happy either. "How special is that?" jibed Crane, breaking down her train of thought.

This time, she was saved the hassle of responding. "You've ended up where we first met," said the Doctor cuttingly. "Behind bars. Now stop gibbering and let Martha do her work."

"Not exactly," murmured Crane sullenly. "We're not in Arkham—not even in Gotham."

"That's true," reflected the Doctor. "A circumstance I hope to remedy very soon."

Martha put on her stethoscope as well as unravelled some bandages, tearing open a number of alcohol pads. She listened for the Joker's heartbeat and pressed two fingers to his wrist, moving cautiously even though he made no movement to suggest he was awake or even conscious.

"Diagnosis, Dr. Jones?" asked the Doctor.

She removed the stethoscope from her ears. "Like I thought. Steady pulse. Lots of cuts and scrapes. But bed rest and food—that's all I can really recommend."

"And that can wait?" asked the Doctor, moving to kneel beside her. "What about the scarring?" The bold red, white, and black makeup was so worn away as to reveal the pinkish-white healed tissue on either side of his mouth.

"Doctor," said Martha calmly, "he's got scars _every_where." She pulled away the leather from the Joker's right wrist to reveal a maze of complicated wounds, recently inflicted, healing badly, and not just the work of someone with a razor and a suicide wish. Martha loosened the Joker's tie and pulled away his shirt to the edge of his collarbone, where there was a nasty bruise forming, but underneath it, filmy, unhealthy skin. "That's a second-degree burn," Martha said.

"Maybe I'll be able to find out what the truth really is," said the Doctor.

"Are you sure that's ethical?" whispered Martha. "I mean, reading the mind of someone who's conscious is one thing, but—"

"Oh, yes, I'm sure it would be a walk in the park to do otherwise. 'Hello there, Joker. I'm going to read your mind. I hope that's all right with you.'" Sarcasm this insistent hurt, coming from the Doctor. "And _you _talk to me about ethics!"

Martha got to her feet. "Fine, then. Do it. I'll bandage him up afterwards." She crossed her arms and leaned against the door of the Perspex prison, watching. From his cell next door, Crane was also watching, silently, with undisguised interest.

The Doctor leaned down and held his arms out, placing his thumbs on the Joker's cheekbones and his fingers at his temples. Martha held her breath.

* * *

"Gwen's giving Mickey the grand tour," said Jack, leaning back in his office chair as Bruce Wayne stood beside his desk. He'd gotten changed from the makeshift Batman costume he and Jack had been able to throw together at short notice. He knew he looked like hell, though, after the fight with the Weevils, if Jack's condition gave him anything to go by.

"Jack," said Bruce in a low voice, looking down.

"What?"

"You lost someone. You and your Torchwood team. Your medic. Your . . . friend, by the sound of it.

Jack swallowed and ran a hand through his hair, then rubbed under his eyes tiredly. "Earlier in the year. You're right. It was our medic, Owen Harper. And our tech expert, Toshiko Sato." He smiled bittersweetly. "Tosh, everyone called her."

"How did you lose them?"

"Does it matter? I recruited them. We'd lost people before—Torchwood, I mean, and I've lost—well . . ." Jack gulped and got up, noisily making a show of pouring a bottle of whiskey neat into two shot glasses. "It's dangerous, what we do, and they all knew that." With thunder in his eyes, he offered Bruce a glass. Bruce took the glass but made no motion to drink it. "Gwen probably hasn't told you how she got into this job." Bruce shook his head. "Back when she was a PC, she saw a Weevil. Normally when the rest of the world enters our little universe of aliens and the inexplicable, we give them a little pill, and they forget. But Gwen wouldn't give up. She wanted to be a part of Torchwood. Ianto—whom you haven't met—was the same way." Jack downed his whiskey in one gulp. "But Tosh and Owen were different. I came to them. Granted, their situations when I went to them were such I probably made it impossible to refuse. Which I used to my advantage, of course."

"How did you join Torchwood?" asked Bruce.

Jack's face lit up briefly with some kind of incommunicable amusement. "Ah well . . . it's kind of a long story—"

"No doubt with time travel and space voyages in it," said Bruce wryly.

"It was a bit of a con," said Jack. "Because I used to be a con man. It's probably in my Oracle file—ex-Time Agent and all that. Torchwood served my ends, and it was a bit of a promise, to an old friend. Besides, I know a bit about aliens—" Jack seemed on the verge of continuing, of saying something important, but he looked at Bruce and poured himself a second shot.

"So you blame yourself, for their deaths?"

"Yes and no. Why do you ask, Bruce?"

"We're alike, in some ways."

"Yes, the incredible charm and gorgeous good looks would seem to coincide."

Bruce smiled and rolled his eyes. "I lost my parents. They were murdered in front of me." Jack stopped grinning and became very still. "And because of the Joker, I lost a friend. I lost an ally, and the city lost two very important fighters, fighters for justice. But I . . . I lost my best friend, someone I loved."

"It's always the personal touch, isn't it?" asked Jack bitterly. "Raging maniacs can kill dozens of people, on our watch, and it's on our heads—and we feel it every time. But it's different when it's someone you love."

Bruce finally took a drink of the whiskey. "Have you ever just been tempted to give up? Lead a normal life and leave this mantle to someone else?"

Jack laughed. "Though I'd sometimes _love _to, I can't. I can never lead 'a normal life.'"

"I'm beginning to think," said Bruce, sipping his whiskey, "neither can I."

* * *

The Doctor had been trapped in the Matrix before, being pursued by the Master's champion in every possible guise and with every kind of weapon. It had been like a nightmare, the kind no one woke up from. The Doctor's sheer force of will had usually been underestimated by his enemies, to their detriment. He had been in the minds of felons and angels before, but nothing was quite so weird and black and disorienting as the Joker's mind.

Normally the Doctor could attain some kind of control over the brain he was reading, like opening up a filing cabinet and picking out the manila folder one wanted. But the Joker's mind refused to cooperate, kept thinking its thoughts in joyful disarray. The closest thing the Doctor had experienced before was the mind of Astrolabus, another demented Time Lord.

There were just thoughts at first, impulses and niggling neurotic fancies. A craving for a reuben sandwich was followed swiftly by a mind's-eye inventory of every knife the brain's owner had ever used, including the funny one that looked like a potato peeler. There were a few sentences from _A Clockwork Orange _and floor plans of banks, apparently memorized.

_Enough, _thought the Doctor, helpless against the avalanche of minutiae. There had to be memories and deeper desires, the foundations of a character, the answers the Doctor sought. Did the Doctor want to wound and cut deeper? He could hardly imagine the Joker was going to turn out Snape-like, damaged from childhood humiliation and unrequited love, but anything was possible.

A huge, double-scoop ice cream cone. That was the happy memory the Doctor could screen through all the blood, explosions, cries, and frenetic darkness. He couldn't tell if it was a childhood memory, or a more recent one, but the sensory perception of the ice cream was real enough, mint chocolate chip and strawberries'n'cream frozen yogurt. The Doctor had been at the World's Fair where the waffle cone was invented, so he could understand the boy-Joker's (or man-Joker's; he couldn't quite tell) relishing this particular waffle cone so much.

The Doctor pushed deeper. The more pleasant the memory, the easier to go unnoticed, taking away what he'd come for. There was an overreaching fondness for guillotines and the smell of gunpowder, and an incredibly rich collection of hand-painted Joker cards. Firmly the Doctor pushed past this.

There was a rat-trap hell-hole of an apartment in what the Doctor assumed was Gotham. In the tiny room a TV blared with some kind of video game waiting in savage boredom. Phil Collins was playing loudly on a stereo, and an armoire overflowed with a variety of boxer shorts in all sorts of motifs—rubber duckies, smiley faces, sheep, hearts, stars. _What the hell . . .? _thought the Doctor.

The Joker was doodling in crayon on a tiny sheet of paper. He drew a heart, and, to match his cracked smile, he wrote "girly."

The Doctor was suddenly and ferally swerved away from this scene to one of a pitifully crying young woman tied to a chair in a warehouse, surrounded by tanks of gasoline, begging not for her life, but for the life of someone named Harvey.

_This isn't what I want to see! _thought the Doctor, moving past looming and statuesque still frames of Batman in all his muscled glory leaping from buildings and saving children, etc.

The Joker's laughter answered the Doctor's frustration, and outside, in the cell, the Doctor registered that his patient was stirring. "Is this what you want?" asked the Joker's voice-in-mind.

There were pages torn out of a storybook, read in a sing-song voice, each of them spattered with blood. "Once upon a time, there was a boy with an alcoholic father and a battered mother. One day, Daddy got too rough with the kitchen knife . . ."

The Doctor could hear and feel the slicing of flesh, and the only thing that helped him to block out the screams was the knowledge that, even in his mind, the Joker couldn't decide on his story . . .

"Once upon a time," the voice picked up again, like a record that had skipped, "there was a wife who couldn't afford surgery, and a husband who used razor blades in the place of empathy . . ."

The Doctor shoved aside all images of the Glasgow grin; they were all false and left no room for pity. _Did you do it yourself, for fun? _

"Maybe this is what you wanted to see," said the voice-in-mind, coming up on sharp focus of Martha's capture earlier in the Margam house. The Joker was making her face into a jack-o-lantern.

The Doctor gritted his teeth. He opened his eyes and found the Joker's eyes were open, too. "See anything you liked?" he asked.

"I saw enough," said the Doctor, disgustedly throwing his hands down just as the Joker lunged for his throat. The Doctor kicked out as he got to his feet, but he was too slow. The Joker's gloved fingers encircled the Time Lord's throat.


	17. Chapter 17

The Doctor's hands were closing around the Joker's throat, and what the painted madman didn't know was that the Doctor could feign death and hold his breath for a very long time.

Neither, though, did Martha, who ran into the cell with a syringe and stabbed it into the Joker's thigh. The Joker, indeed physically exhausted from all his ailments plus lack of food and sleep in the last 24 hours, crumpled up and sagged to the floor with a grunt.

"What was that?" asked the Doctor, stumbling to his feet and loosening his tie, coughing.

"Sedative," said Martha. "He's going to be very much drugged up when I get him decent for going back to Gotham to be locked away. Let this Arkham place deal with him when he gets there."

"In a cell far away from mine," added Crane quietly.

Martha helped the Doctor stand. "Now we're even," she said.

"Too right," said the Doctor with a smile, hugging her. "Let's find Mickey," he told her as they both made their way upstairs.

"Did you find what you were looking for?" asked Martha.

"Yes and no," sighed the Doctor. "I've got the readings that should help Mickey recreate the exact combinations of forces needed to bring the Gotham universe parallel to ours, and with a little shove—"

"So you can get them back, Crane and the Joker and Batman," said Martha. "Which is great." They had reached the Hub offices where Mickey was flipping ferociously through a comic book which he was showing to a rather bored Gwen. "But what about . . .?"

"Curiosity's always been my downfall," said the Doctor soberly.

"Tell me something I _don't _know." The Doctor looked a little hurt, so Martha added, "I mean, didn't you find the key to the puzzle? The secret to nature or nurture? Was the Joker always as messed up as he is now? Or was it something as dramatic as disfiguration? As—"

"You know," interrupted Mickey, eating a piece of pizza with one hand and shaking the comic book with the other, "the original DC universe Joker fell into a chemical vat and it made him crazy. _Fact._" Gwen rolled her eyes. "What? Why shouldn't we believe somethin' like that? Here they are, real as you or me, flesh an' blood, these characters from comics."

The Doctor smiled sadly. "Yes. As real as you or me." Martha gave him a funny look. "I don't suppose we'll ever know."

"What?" asked Gwen.

"Martha, would you please tell, er, Bruce Wayne that we've got him a one-way ticket back to Gotham. If he wants it. Mickey, can I get you online? We have some data to run through the system."

"Right," said Mickey, wiping the pizza grease one the back of his hand and throwing the comic book into Gwen's lap. "And Doctor, you are not gonna believe—"

"Gwen, could you give us a hand, please?"

"Whatever you say," said Gwen, throwing up her hands as if nothing would ever surprise her again. She put down the comic book next to her PC.

* * *

"I can't believe you went into the Joker's _mind _to find how the Rift struck in the first place," said Jack, following Martha, Bruce, and into the main office area of the Hub. The Doctor, Mickey, and Gwen exchanged looks.

"I would have had the data myself," said the Doctor, "but I was knocked out when the semi made the jump across the Rift."

"It's brilliant," said Bruce, shaking the Doctor's hand.

"According to this," said Mickey, gesturing to his plasma screen and biting the crust of his third slice of pizza, "the Rift is going to slice along Mermaid Quay at 12:45 tomorrow morning, just less than 24 hours after its initial contact with this universe."

"So, in the relative safety of the UNIT-issued van, we should be able to—"

"Catch a wave, like riding a surfboard," finished Jack. "Yeah, Doc, gotta agree with Brucie here. Good show."

"Welllll, I couldn't have done it without Mickey . . ."

"Or the Joker," muttered Martha.

"Did you hear that? Without _me. _Mickey Smith, defendin' the universe, _again—"_

"I think we all deserve a little champagne!" shouted Gwen.

"Champagne?" asked Bruce, quirking a brow at Gwen.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," said Jack. "They haven't gotten back _yet._"

"Um, sorry to interrupt," said Martha, barely able to conceal her excited anxiety, "but I've got to be back in London by six tonight."

"Picking out bridesmaids' dresses?" teased Jack.

"Oh, God, not that again!" said Gwen, all smiles.

"It's been a . . . trip," Martha said, shaking Bruce's hand and then hugging Mickey, Gwen, and Jack, "but I'd best be going."

Jack squeezed Martha close, perhaps too close. "We couldn't rope you into staying on in a more permanent capacity?" he said rakishly.

Martha bit her lip. "I'm not saying no, just not right now, okay, Jack?" Jack chuckled and released her, moving with the others toward the giant screen where they scanned the evening news.

Martha turned to the Doctor. "You've got to go back with them, don't you? To get the TARDIS?"

"And this is one mess I'm not running away from," said the Doctor, burying his hands in his long brown coat that he'd managed to find somewhere. "I set them free. They may have talked me into it, they may have preyed upon my sense of justice and manipulated me, but I'm the one who set the Joker and the Scarecrow loose on the populations of two cities. People have died."

His gaze met Bruce's from across the room. They were nearly eye-to-eye, studying each other in silence. Bruce left the others and nodded to the Doctor. "We can only lock them up, Doctor. They will probably escape again. There are no guarantees."

"Then that's what _you're _there for," said the Doctor. He turned back to Martha, who gave him another hug.

"Don't be a stranger," she said. "I'm gonna send you an invitation to the wedding, okay?" She waved and ran off before the Doctor could turn her down. Bruce, Gwen, Jack, and Mickey walked back to the Doctor's side.

"I guess these are all the farewells," said Jack.

"You're not gonna ask me to join up or nothin'?" asked Mickey bashfully. " 'Cause you asked Martha, and I thought . . ."

"C'mere, you," said Jack, putting Mickey into a headlock and giving him a noogie.

"Mickey, Gwen," said Bruce, shaking their hands.

"Aw, man, I would love to ride in the Batmobile," said Mickey.

Bruce grinned. "If we ever see each other again, I promise: you will."

"Okay, cool, man."

Gwen cleared her throat and reached up to plant a kiss on Bruce's cheek. "Thank you, um, Batman, for your help, and have a safe journey," she said, voice slightly unsteady.

"Gwen, you minx," teased Jack. "You're married, you know."

Gwen walked away with Mickey, fingers in ears, muttering "la la la, I can't hear you." "I'm sorry about your pterodactyl," said Bruce.

"Yeah, well, you can't imagine what it took to clean up its poop," said Jack. They shook hands. "Losing new friends," said Jack, clapping Bruce's arm. "Somehow just as bad as losing old ones." He worked his jaw, staring with faint regret at Bruce. He swept the other man in for a hug and gently grazed his lips against Bruce's cheek. "Good luck to you, Bruce. And to Batman, too."

"Thanks," said Bruce. "And to you."

Jack walked away, casting one querulous look over his shoulder. Bruce rubbed his cheek thoughtfully.

* * *

As the Doctor got into the cab of the UNIT van, mentally counting Martha's driver as yet another of casualties, he could hear the Joker muttering to himself in the back of the van. "What doesn't kill you makes you stranger . . . eh, Doc?"


	18. Chapter 18

Ianto Jones woke up with a start. He had fallen asleep at the public entrance to Torchwood underneath the harbour at Roald Dahl Plas, an unassuming and quiet mock-office selling old-fashioned postcards of Cardiff and offering the infrequent visitor weak tea. Wiping the drool off his jacket, Ianto checked his watch. It was 3:30 in the afternoon. He looked around him. Had the Doctor and Batman already taken the Scarecrow and the Joker back through the Rift to Gotham? He moved to pick up the phone to call Jack, but caught himself and burst out laughing. Batman?!

Still, it had been an extraordinary dream, he thought, as the left the public entrance to find something a bit stronger to drink. He'd imagined it in such detail, and it was as if he'd been all the characters—Jack meeting Bruce in the Batcave, the Doctor in ignorance of his Arkham cellmates, Martha nearly getting her throat cut, all those Weevils on the attack . . .

Maybe he'd be able to turn it into a saucy roleplay for the next time he and Jack used the stopwatch . . . As Ianto tottered through the Torchwood wine cellar—not many people knew it existed—he was required to pass the holding cells. So he nearly jumped out of his skin when he heard scratching and hissing coming from inside one of the cells. He'd dropped and smashed the tea tray he'd been carrying; the sugar bowl burst and left shiny white all over the floor, the milk ran down the drain.

Horrified, Ianto peered into the cell where the racket was coming from. Inside, a woman dressed in black leather was angrily running the claw-like nails of her costume across the Perspex walls. Her face was half-hidden by a set of cat-eyed goggles. "Catwoman?!"

"Where the hell am I?" she hissed. "You can't keep me here, I demand to see my lawyer! I've got friends in high _and _low places, and if I don't get an explanation _right now, _I'm going to tear this glass to kingdom come!"

Ianto fainted.

**Roll Torchwood Credits**

**THE END (?)**


End file.
